Wallace

So, my S2 is my daily driver, and I take every single precaution I can to prevent door dings, hit-and-runs, etc.

I park far away so no one parks next to me.
I leave a lot of space when parallel parking.
I try not to park next to coupes (they have longer doors, and more swing).

Yesterday I was parallel parked uphill.
I left like 6 ft between me and the car in front.
When I came back another car was in front of me, a lot closer.
As I walked to me car, I saw the driver of the car parked in front of me walking to her car.
I instantly had one of those feelings. I just KNEW she was going to back into my car.
As I walked towards my car, I checked to make sure my tow hook was high enough to hit her bumper. It was.
I even stood outside my car, and watched because I was so sure she was going to hit my car.
Sure enough, she backs up a little, then backs up A LOT and smacks my car (not softly either).
I ran up to her window, gave her the "WTF ARE YOU DOING GESTURE", and she rolled down her window.
I said a few choice words, then checked to see if there was any damage.
Her bumper had a nice verticle indentation and some missing paint. Mine, not a scratch.

Needless to say, I love my front tow hook.

SamGrant951

ditto, never take mine out.

Cris Brady

I don't know, this may belong in the "I'm an Idiot" thread going on now, but here's one where the tow hook didn't save me.

When I was first getting starting with the track stuff 10 years ago, I used to run with the tow hook in and swap brake pads when I got to the track. At the end of the track day, I would pull the Hawk blues and put whatever street pads I was running. One morning I was at Summit Point. I arrived at the track early, it was cold and damp, threating rain. I jacked the car up and swapped out the pads, and then it was time for the drivers meeting. Off I go into the classroom. When the meeting was over it was pouring rain. I was in Green group and not scheduled to go out for another hour, so I hung out in the classroom with a bunch of others. No trailer or canopy to duck under for me then. Eventually it was time for my first session. My instructor shows up at my car and gets in. We head out thru the paddock and onto the false grid, just putting along. We'll be in the middle of the line. As I approach the cars in front of me, my instructor is chatting away and I engage the brakes to put it right behind the next car in line.

My foot goes to the floor! I had forgotten to pump the brake pedal after putting the pads and then got distracted by the call to the meeting. I never remembered several hours later.

Of course my brain immediately knew what was wrong and just like in a major event, time slowed down. I started pumping the pedal for all I'm worth but it's not coming back up in time. Meanwhile the owner of the car in front of me was leaning on his car watching me pull up and with no sign of me slowing down he was starting to get agitated. The instructor in the right seat started yelling at me "WTF, slow down, slow down!" At this point my brain was locked up in horror and I couldn't say anything but just kept pumping so it looked like I just blindly running into another guy's car. Every instructor's nightmare. He's yelling, now the 911 owner is freaking, and then BLAM! I plow into the 911 in front of me. All this happens in a split second. A stunned silence descends in the pit lane.

Finally my brain lets my mouth start working again and I explain what had happened. We get out of the car and examine the damage. My car? not a scratch. The 911? A nice big perfect hole the perfect size of tow hook all the through his fiberglass rear bumper. Yup a nice, big, $985 hole <- what it cost to fix.

To this day, after I replace pads in a brake caliper, I get up and into the car and pump the pedal. Always! Some lessons are more expensive that others.

xsboost90

yeah cant say i havent done that- just never ran into anything! Everyone asks me about the tow hook i just say its so people dont walk too close.

billthe3

How well do you think paint would hold up on one of those? I have one, but keep it back in the tool kit cause it looks sort of odd out front, but if it could be painted black or something it wouldn't be as noticable...

SamGrant951

Mines powdercoated, cost prob 10-15 bucks..will last much longer than paint in the elements.

billthe3

Black? How does it look?

SamGrant951

Well mines coated to match my intake/wheels so its a dark grey..but they can definitely powdercoat one black no problem. If you hadnt noticed I LOVE powdercoat. Super glossy/deep, lasts forever, cleanup involves wiping it off, etc...whats not to love.

billthe3

It requires more effort than spraying something with a rattle can in the back yard. But I'm a lazy *** bastard like that.


I suppose I should look for some powdercoating places around here.

shiners780

Mine's rattle-canned. It holds up great until you put a metal hook on it then the paint scratches fairly easy. A quick spray and it looks like new again - the beauty of rattle cans.

FRporscheman

I once made a mistake in gridlock traffic and plowed into a car's rear end at about 15-20mph. I think if I had a tow hook on, I would have definitely damaged his car and possibly tweaked my bumper frame? But luckily both cars' bumpers showed almost no sign of damage so we both just went on with life.

V2Rocket

I'd use regular spraypaint because if someone does back into you the paint will come off and you could have proof in case theres some damage.

mark_uss

need tow hook now..

chris_v

in racing we strongly discourage the tow hooks that stick out and are metal, we prefer the "bump friendly" nylon straps that we attach to the bumper shocks.

billthe3

But then there won't be any bruising left over from the love taps. That doesn't sound like fun.