orthojoe

From my understanding, the increased risk of compression injury (shoulder or spine) comes from the shoulder belts being mounted too LOW. Not the issue in this case. The higher mounting point will not keep me planted down as well in case of a rollover because there is some room for me to slide up. This is no different than using a 3 point (mounting points are above the shoulder as well), although I would argue that the belts in the 6pt will still hold me down better than the 3 point.

lithium1330

JFYI, 5 or 6pt harness setup without HANS device puts the driver at an increased risk of neck related injury in the event of a crash, compared to a 3pt setup. The harness will hold your body tightly to the seat, while the head (+ 3lbs helmet) decelerate at a much different rate than rest of your body. HANS makes sure your body and head decel at the same rate. If you invest in a harness setup, pls also invest in HANS.

Forgot to say.... nice driving and looks like a fun track! I run at Sebring now, but certainly miss the elevation changes many other tracks offer.

Plavan

You are right. I have always thought the BK extension was done on the bottom of the rollbar (floorpan) to extend it up.

Craig67

Great videos Joe and great driving!! Thanks for sharing.

orthojoe

Thanks!

I'm not disputing anything you're saying, but doesn't the presence of an airbag negate some of these concerns? Airbags lower the rate of cervical spine injuries, which is what we are worried about here when using a HANS. If I had a pure race car with no airbags, that would be a different story altogether.

Keep in mind here, that I'm just there to have fun. I don't compete, I don't do open passing. I'm still running street tires! I just think I'd look kind of silly showing up to an HPDE (I don't race) with a HANS device wearing a t-shirt underneath. Now I need to get a race suit? Now I look even more dumb than I usually do at an HPDE.

The 6point was purchased to lock me into the seat better so I don't have to fight against the G-forces and make my driving easier. Besides, those pass throughs built into the sport buckets demanded to be used.

medtech

Joe,

What's up with "Booger" in the passenger seat? He looks bored. Tell him to just man-up, rip that glove off, and bury a knuckle! lol

orthojoe

Haha. Something about my car makes my friends want to pick at their noses.

lithium1330

Unfortunately, unless you sit about a foot from the airbag, the airbag will not be very effective, if at all it even reaches your body or your head that's tightly harnessed to the seat. When you introduced 5/6pt harness, what you've done is effectively changed the safety parameters (e.g., factory airbag is designed as supplemental restraint to factory 3pt seat belts) of the car.
Don't take this the wrong way, I am not trying to tell you how you should run DEs... It's a hobby for most of us (i've been doing DE's for 10+ yrs), and we balance between cost, safety and fun. I bring this up b/c I want to share information with others so people can make an inform decision. I apologies if you're already familiar how harness and HANS are an integral part of a safety system.

Anyways, for anyone not familiar with why HANS should be used with 5/6pt harness, here is a 38sec video about it.

Here is a video comparing without and with HANS - note the range of head movement between the videos. It's said that without HANS, head movement can be as much as 40cm, while with HANS is 26cm.

orthojoe

Lithium, any and all comments/criticisms are welcome and are never taken the wrong way. These post are informative not only for me, but for others as well. Thanks!

cvazquez

Joe,

Awesome driving and video footage... you certainly captured the moment. Had you on my 60inch plasma with Bose surround system on and it looks and sounds AWESOME!

Keep those vids coming!

All the best!

orthojoe

I'm honored that my video was displayed on your 60 inch plasma!
The mic placement made all the difference in the world. Without the audio, the videos aren't quite as exciting... at least with the way I drive.

Schmidts Cat

Really sweet joe. wish I had made it up. The remote mic is the way to go for sure... sounded amazing. Thanks for posting the details. Please let me know next time you are going out, would love to join you. How did you feel in turn 1? Seems like you were leaving a bit on the table?

orthojoe

I was leaving A LOT on the table on turn one. For some reason I went a step backwards during this last trip to the track. Things I used to do very well, and things I know I should be doing, didn't happen. The whole day I only hit turn 1 well once. Here's a data overlay between me and my friend's 997.2 GT3. My 2:12 (blue) vs his 2:10 (red). First dip is turn 1:


I'll blame it on my excitement of being able to heel/toe, and 1 year hiatus with the spyder at the track. Nothing to do now but go back and fix my 'problems'.

Schmidts Cat

I don't know... sounds pretty good. What did you expect to run? Don't you expect to be at least a second or two off the GT3?

orthojoe

I do. However, I would expect the both of us (me and GT3 friend) to run better times than we were. Bensf runs 2:08s in his spyder on street tires. I'd be happy running 2:10 with my current setup.