time to PO the ricers

2wd or 4wd

  • 2wd

    Votes: 43 13.2%

  • 4wd

    Votes: 282 86.8%
  • Total voters
    325
bjoehandley said:
Did you hear about the Metra wreck out here the day before Thanksgiving aspera?
Click to expand...

No, but your story makes me think of a few things that a layman wouldn't.

First: Were the crossing devices working correctly? If they are powered crossing lights/gates, then it is recorded within the crossing device.
Second: Did the engineer blow the horn, ring the bell, and hit the emergency air brakes before impact? Besides going the correct speed, that's all that he can do. All that data is recorded ON the engine (in a black box called an event recorder). All radio transmissions are also recorded.

The husband will probably "lawyer up" and sue the engineer. I'm going to assume that the NTSB's findings are correct, that the engineer did his job. In fact, it sounds like he "plugged it" and "emergency toned the dispacter" immediately. If so, this guy should get a parade...kinda like a fireman that saves people from a burning building. Have you ever tried to change the radio station in your car when you're sliding off the road or into another car? That's how awkward toning-up the dispacther is when you are about to ram into half a dozen cars full of people.

Metra trains are pretty light as trains go, so they stop much quicker. They also (generally) have better disk brakes. The reason that nobody died could very well be due to the engineer's quick reflexes.

Of course this is all speculation, but the data is out there. The surprise is who OWNS the data. When a plane crashes, the NTSB and FAA get the black box. Same goes for boats and ships, I think. Railroads own the data on event recorders. They have much better access and control of that data compared to a family suing them.

I'd look at the crossing device and the stop lights. They might not have been working correctly and allowed cars to stack up on the crossing. Or maybe not. Crossings a just plain dangerous. People have always died on them and always will. All it takes is for the driver to be thinking about something else. "late for work", "in a hurry", "good song on the radio", and "bacon double cheeseburger" can get you killed.

:lecture: :laugh3:
 
"Some area rail crossings have safety systems in place that override nearby traffic signals when a train is approaching to help clear traffic near the tracks, but the intersection where the accident occurred does not have such a system in place.

NTSB investigator David Rayburn said a decision was made to not include the system at that intersection because it could extend the amount of time the crossing gates are down from 54 seconds to more than two minutes. That might encourage some impatient motorists to drive around the crossing gates, he said."

I just found this in an article. It sounds like bumper-to-bumper Holiday gridlock was a factor.

The train was 1 engine and 6 cars. Dinky.

"The NTSB chairman has already suggested building a bridge or a tunnel to separate the traffic from the tracks. But the mayor of Elmwood Park says that would cost too much."<====The solution is right there. You either pay with money or you pay with lives the next time this happens.
 
Last edited:
Evedentily this has been a problem area for years and finally came to a head that night. In all honesty not only should the drivers parked on the tracks been aware of what can happen there, b ut they should get the $500 tickets driving around the gates is supposed to get you and maybe charged with tresspassing too (atleast in Illinois when the gates go down, anybody who isn't employeed by a railroad, including LEO's are tresspassers!) maybe make the 6 who got hit (if not all who were in the crossing at the time) claim all the damage caused on their car insurance. They at the very least need to put officers in a position to ticket any motorist's that end up in that position, there are signs saying not to stop on tracks, there have been problems for years here, and the city or county could make a killing on all the tickets written.
 
aspera said:
I'd LOVE to be able to charge a cop with tresspassing! :laugh3:
Click to expand...


How 'bout a Judge? When Dad was still at CNW he passed a Judge on a motorcycle while in an unmarked railroad truck, then after he pulled back into the lane the judge motioned for him to pull over. Guess the judge felt Dad cut him off so the judge placed him under citizens arrest and wanted Dad to follow him back to the police station. On the way to the station they came up to a crossing that had the gates down, so the Judge drove around them. When the got to the station Dad announced to the officer he would like to place the Judge under Citizens Arrest for driving around the lowered crossing gates. The Judge decided not to press charges for being cut off if Dad didn't press charges for the crossing violation :laugh3:
 
aspera said:
I'll skip all the rest and point out what I notice in just this one sentence.

I work on the railroad, and a few years ago our train hit a semi truck. It exploded. Big fireball. Now why would an XJ survive when a Mack truck was slapped out of the way like a hooker? Well... You say it was hit "in the back". You also omitted the speed of impact. A glancing blow at 15 mph is nowhere near the same thing as a direct hit at 55-70MPH.

Now I'm wondering WHY the XJ was hit. Sounds like driver error to me. Was the guy trying to beat the train? Did he drive around the gates? Those tracks didn't just get laid down yesterday. The train didn't swerve to hit the Jeep either.

Was the Jeep white? Railroads use white XJs, sometimes.

The details make the difference. That one sentence makes it sound like an XJ is a freakin' tank. The reality is the XJ got off easy. One engine alone weighs 400,000 pounds. A train can weigh 16,000 TONS. A Cherokee weighs ~4000 pounds. I bet the only part that still looked like an XJ was the part that didn't get hit.
Click to expand...

The XJ was stolen and the person that stole it I guess used it for something else but the was no driver in it and the Jeep was left on the tracks. There was no access to a road where they found it. It looked like a bunch of tracks side by side just out from under a bridge. I have no idea how fast the train was going but it was reported that the Jeep was pushed for about a kilometer before the train fully stopped. They found it on a diagonal to the tracks. I believe the Jeep was red.

Heres a video of someone Jeep getting hit by a train.
http://www.quadscentral.com/videos/Trainhitsjeep.html

And another link to a guy who got hit by a train in his Jeep.
http://www.thekansascitychannel.com/news/2722656/detail.html

And another.. (No pic though)
http://www.azstarnet.com/dailystar/relatedarticles/30998.php
 
Last edited:
Trains & XJs: This could be a reference was to a local incident. Someone wanted to kill himself and thought the way to do it was to park his XJ on the tracks in north LA and then changed his mind last minute and abandoned the XJ. The commuter train that hit it derailed killing 11 people while the XJ was kind of knocked out of the way sort-of intact. Ironically, the prosecutor requested the death penalty be used. It scared me at the time because my mom works as a property manager and travels around So. Cal and was on that train line that day. Good thing was she was on another train and traveling in the opposite direction. Read about it. I was blown away that my vehicle is hefty enough to destroy trains, especially since another train wreck I saw resulted in no deaths:

I saw an Amtrack train hit full speed, a fully loaded car carrier truck that ignored the signs and got high centered or stuck over a crossing . This before they made the road suface even at the crossing. I was pretty young at the time, it was in the late 80s but it left a big impression on me. This truck was annihlated, cars were thrown off, a big bang and dust were produced. It was an incredible to see this heavy truck thrown like a toy.

Skylines & RB engines: Given the chance, I take one of these over American muscle anyday. Why? Even though the power isin't good until the turbo kicks in, I think its cool how it makes that much power for the displacement it has. Only about 2 1/2 litres what a power to displacement ratio... Total apples to oranges comparison applying that tech to a Jeep though.

BTW how did we get through such a wide range of topics?
 
Last edited:
It may b cool, but like I said before, it's got a power adder, and there is only so much you can put into it before it blows up. If you built a jeep I6 with no limit on $, I'll bet you could do more.
 
If you want to go big wait a few for the srt 8 gr. cher. to come out some one will wad one up and get that drive train has a 6.1 hemi and a 1 gear t-case that is super light and is ifs in a mj it would scary fast
 
A guy up near me is working on a Little Red Express. Emphasis on the express. When he's done it'll have a twin turbo Viper V10 under it's hood :sunshine: Don't know much else about it though, unfortunately.

My project when I get the money is building a '98 2-door Neon with a 3.5L HO & 42LE out of a 300M Special, mid-engine, rear wheel drive. Whatcha think of that guys and gals?
 
db209_2000 said:
A guy up near me is working on a Little Red Express. Emphasis on the express. When he's done it'll have a twin turbo Viper V10 under it's hood :sunshine: Don't know much else about it though, unfortunately.

My project when I get the money is building a '98 2-door Neon with a 3.5L HO & 42LE out of a 300M Special, mid-engine, rear wheel drive. Whatcha think of that guys and gals?
Click to expand...

That is going to take an incredible ammount of chopping to get it to fit, and strengthning to make stop the "frame" from twisting arround itself. if he can do that i will be amazed
 
I've seen a few websites with mid-engined Hondas and twin engined VWs. IIRC, the VW has identical strut towers front and rear. The Honda guys have to 'create' all of that. That's what the mid-engined Neon would have to do. Even grafting in the 300M engine bay from a donor car would require tons of work. That would just be the start. Relocating things like the gas tank and such, and then plumbing and wiring the 300M engine would be even more work.

The end project would 'only' be a V6 and still just be a Neon.

A more sensible crazy project would be to find a mid-90s garden variety 2-door Impreza and plop an LS1/T56 in it. Anything that needs to be upgraded can choose from the whole catalog of parts available for the WRX/STi. A more 'Mopar' solution would be the same swap with a 6.1 Hemi instead of the LS1, but I think that's a heavier engine. The Impreza already has a very wide engine bay (for the boxer), a transmission tunnel (for the transaxle), and IRS. Of course the R160 needs to be upgraded to an R200 diff (or similar) and a custom driveshaft used. Normally the boxer engine shares the engine bay with part of the transaxle. With that removed, there is ample room for a longer V8. The end result might be an Impreza with closer to 50/50 weight distribution and much lighter than the 3200lb STi.
 
All that just to make a 12 sec car. You can do it with ricers, but you've got to spend gobs of money and time. Another thing; I was flipping through a ricer mag this morning and was viewing all the mods of the cars that make it into the mag. One was a whole article on a Right hand drive integra with plug wires, fart can exhuast, an intake, gauges galor, and even his "high performance" splitfire plugs and royal purple sythetic everything. They also listed all the body kit crap seperetly like the wing, carbon fiber hood, carbon fiber shift nob, ground effects, etc. ARE YOU F'ING KIDDING ME!?!?!? The only reason this thing was even in the mag was because this guy was retarded enough to spend the money to get a RHD integra (from Japan), when he could have just bought a LHD one for half that and actaully spent his money on something that helps his car break into the high 15's. And do you ever notice how the only cars they ever have in those mags that ever have any horse power figures or quarter mile times are gutted not-even-real-car pro dragsters with 1100hp "proving" how much potential there is in a 4 banger this or that. There was a guy that saw me reading it, thought I like ricers, and started to try to talk to me about how he had a fast car to. I asked him what it was, and he said chevy cavalier Z24!!! Than he started trying to explain to me about "nos" and how it works not just at full throttle, but all the time because "you hook it up to your computer and it does it's own fuel managment, just like in F&F, but you have to have a laptop". This guy was swearing up and down he new what the hell he was talking about. I finaly just gave up, smiled, and told him he must have known about some new product I didn't yet. Ricers are idiots, and they give import enthusiasts a bad name. Sorry, I've been hold that in for a while--feel much better now!!! hasta
 
As soon as the guy told you he had a Z24 you knew everything that you needed to know. Oh, and just to be clear...that's a Chevy, so he falls into the 'domestic' camp like it or not. I don't care if he's sporting Altezza lights, blasting hip hop, and talking about NAAAWS. Chevy is domestic.

YOU on the other hand are obviously smarter than the domestic driving Z24 dude. And you claim to have a Skyline, right? So, that means that YOU (the import owner) are a much smarter car nut than the nitwit domestic owner.

I find it funny that you choose to fly the 'domestic' flag and rip on the guy with the Chevy as a 'ricer'. What up wit dat? :D

I pretty much agree with you on the magazine. Some magazines suck and others are really great. The funny thing is that some of the worst Honda-product-only magazines have some of the best tech articles. Not always, but not never. Same goes for Hotrod magazine. Some months just suck. Other times they have tech articles that clear away the mystery and myths for some good old science.
 
Yeah, the Z24 thing tiped me off right away. I know chevy is domestic, but I consider ricer and import enthusiest two differant things. Having a rational discusion about the merits of small econo-racer type "import" (be they domestic or foriegn) is something we can do here. I just don't like imports, it's my preference, but I respect a lot of them. Ricers on the other hand, are idiots that accumulated the sum of the car knowlege from the Fast and the Furious movies. O yeah, and I live in Japan, so technicaly, I still drive a "domestic" Skyline :laugh3:
 
Cjmartz2k said:
All that just to make a 12 sec car. You can do it with ricers, but you've got to spend gobs of money and time. Another thing; I was flipping through a ricer mag this morning and was viewing all the mods of the cars that make it into the mag. One was a whole article on a Right hand drive integra with plug wires, fart can exhuast, an intake, gauges galor, and even his "high performance" splitfire plugs and royal purple sythetic everything. They also listed all the body kit crap seperetly like the wing, carbon fiber hood, carbon fiber shift nob, ground effects, etc. ARE YOU F'ING KIDDING ME!?!?!? The only reason this thing was even in the mag was because this guy was retarded enough to spend the money to get a RHD integra (from Japan), when he could have just bought a LHD one for half that and actaully spent his money on something that helps his car break into the high 15's. And do you ever notice how the only cars they ever have in those mags that ever have any horse power figures or quarter mile times are gutted not-even-real-car pro dragsters with 1100hp "proving" how much potential there is in a 4 banger this or that. There was a guy that saw me reading it, thought I like ricers, and started to try to talk to me about how he had a fast car to. I asked him what it was, and he said chevy cavalier Z24!!! Than he started trying to explain to me about "nos" and how it works not just at full throttle, but all the time because "you hook it up to your computer and it does it's own fuel managment, just like in F&F, but you have to have a laptop". This guy was swearing up and down he new what the hell he was talking about. I finaly just gave up, smiled, and told him he must have known about some new product I didn't yet. Ricers are idiots, and they give import enthusiasts a bad name. Sorry, I've been hold that in for a while--feel much better now!!! hasta
Click to expand...
amen to that brotha':laugh3: i was talking to a coworker about rice last week. he said that fwd drive was better on icy roads and was trying to tell me that the wings can HELP LIFT UP the rear, too...:laugh3: and that was after he was bragging about the evo, but he couldn't even tell me what evo was short for<evolution> i also tried to explain to him that nissan is so popular for drifting because they're (mostly) RWD but he was bent on honda...about as close as i will come to "liking" a fwd car would have to be the :us: srt4. the cool thing about those is that they were designed with modifications in mind, and factory stage III kits will get you almost 400 hp.

oh, and heres a little fun fact on 4 poppers. torque is a better measure of the motors actual power. a 200-ish hp 2 liter acura motor (no boost) puts out only 125ft lbs in torque. -less than a jeep 4-banger. more displacement, more torque. that's more consistant with displacement than hp. the high power to displacement is because that engine redlines at 8000 rpm's(and the drivetrain gears it down). power increases with rpm. if it were possible to build a jeep motor to go that fast, imagine what power you would have in comparison... :D i would guess that a high hp stroker would put out well over 400 hp at 7000rpm-and the torque...:D that is, if it were possible to get a jeep motor to go that fast. that's how you can get 800hp out of building a sbc. it's the best of both worlds.
 
I'm pretty sure that the SRT-4 rally driver (Shepherd) and co-driver (Gladysz) are the guys you need to thank. If I have my info straight, Shepherd is the guy who came up with "turbo toys" for the SRT-4 and Gladysz is the guy who gave us the gift of the 6.1L Hemi.

P.S. I like the way that the latest SRT-4 rally cars are prepped. They cut out the rear parcel shelf and trunk hinges. Hardcore.:D No hood hinges either!?!

Wings: FWD cars look stupid with, but can actually benefit from a rear wing. FWD cars are always nose heavy and ass-light. They can also have highly angled hoods. The rear wing is needed to balance the downforce (yes, on some hatchbacks) that can generate on an already heavy nose. Of course 200 percent of the FWD cars that you see with wings don't need them.

8000RPM: So, if you gear that down to a Jeep-like 4000RPM you DOUBLE the torque at the wheels. 125ft lbs is seen as 250ft lbs. But of course the Jeep redlines higher....and of course the Honda engine actually makes more torque. "The engine in the 2006 RSX Type-S will be rated at 201 hp at 7,800 rpm and 140 lb-ft of torque at 7,000 rpm." These are the new SAE ratings, too. They are more conservative.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top