Close Call

[stupott901]

I had a close call in the indy today!!!!!!

Me and the wife were on our way back from shearwater today after having a pleasent walk in longleat forest and i was driving. we were coming round a bend doing  45 -50  and the road narrowed and in front of us was a big lorry and i just slammed on the brakes and skidded and just managed to stop with inches to spare. with lots of tyre smoke and screaching

All i could think was this is going to hurt !!!!!!

I totally forgot about cadence braking Im just glad i wasnt going any faster or it would of hurt

and surprisingly Yvonne is still willing to come out in the car again

Stu

[Krazyken]

Stu

Good to hear that you and Yvonne are safely in one piece.  My Marlin has ABS carried over from the donor and it's surprising how may times that has saved me over the years both on and off track.

[WALNUT]

Glad to hear you stopped in time, my robin hood nearly had sq. wheels after sopping like that a few times.

                                                                                         Tony

['The Gaffer']

Nothing worse than seeing your life flash before your eyes, try 35-45 next time

[paintman]

Glad your both ok Stu!!

Must admit I'm scared to hit my brakes hard.....slight pressure and it stops well, little bit to much and there's smoke everywhere!

Think it's because they're so light....ABS definitely would make sense.

      Tony

[stupott901]

Thanks everyone

Yeah its amazing the difference abs makes and I will be keeping the speed down on the roads I don't know so well

[YellaBelly]

Glad your OK!

Regards cadence braking, it's all very good in theory, but how many of us would think with split seconds to spare "cadence brake, cadence brake"? I bet a dollar I wouldn't I'd be too busy waiting for the bang!

Makes you realise just how easy you can get into trouble in such a light car

[Denzle]

Glad you are both ok Stu.......Take care, you never know whats around a bend....

[YellaBelly]

Denzle just reminded me of something my Dad said once years ago when I first got into motorcycling:

"If you just imagine that around every bend there is an elephant taking a dump you won't go far wrong son"

It's saved me a couple of times on the bike

Imagine my face though if I went round a corner and ther WAS an elephant taking a dump!?

[stupott901]

Some wise words coming out and all taken on board

[Quarrycars]

My Marlin has ABS carried over from the donor .

I had been intending to ask if anyone had used ABS on a kit car and if the calibration is affected by the vehicle weight and tyre size.

One of the problems for us old guys who grew up cadence braking is that we tend to continue to modulate the pedal even when in ABS mode, this confuses the system and results in even longer stopping distances.  It was a big problem with police drivers.  More sophisticated systems now have EBA (Emergency Brake Assist), when the system senses an emergency brake application it will apply the brakes up to ABS threshold even it the driver modulates the pedal or is a 7 stone weakling and can't push the pedal hard enough.  Sound a bit scary but actually works well.

[Krazyken]

As far as I know the ABS system is exactly as it came off the donor.  Both the donor and the Marlin have 15" wheels although in the donor the engine was in the front.

I may just be lucky but the brakes and ABS work well particularly on track and all the pads wear out at the same time.  Braking is naturally biased to the front but the front pads have a much thicker lining to start off with, so them all needing replacing at the same time is about right.

[Quarrycars]

Good to know, what was the donor?

[Sumov8]

Glad you are recording this as a "Near Miss" and not an accident

When transferring brake components from a doner to a kit car the weight difference will make a change in the way the brakes work

The Sumo was a typical example where the manufacture "Pilgrim" quote fitting the balance valve to compnsate the bias from front to rear
which was fine on a Sierra / Granada but the forum recomended not fitting it to the kit as the car would still lock up the front disks before the rear
which is what you want to happen and not the other way around or you will find your ass in front of your elbow

I would recommend we all apply the brakes hard as in an emergency to see what would happen in a controled event
rather than wait for a real incident

['The Gaffer']

I wish I had access to an MOT brake tester for an hour or two

[Krazyken]

The donor for my car was a Rover 218 BRM which had ABS as standard.  When upgrading the pads to EBC the box came marked as Honda Prelude/Accord.  I rang EBC to say they had sent me the wrong pads but they explained that aftermarket pads have to state the heaviest car the brakes were fitted to. 

When the Rover 200 was in the design stage Rover had their tie up with Honda so the 218 brakes came straight out of the Honda parts bin.  That means that the brakes on my Marlin were originally designed for a car weighing best part of 2 tonnes are now in a car weighing 640Kg.  Slightly over engineered but with the stopping power & ABS I'm not complaining.

Top tip this month - don't dismiss Rover as a donor car.  Loads about for cheap as chip prices and Honda engineering, once you get the K-Series HGF causes resolved you have an excellent value under rated package.