strut tower failure
#377
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Haven't heard anything from Viperguy324 on his quest to get a new shock tower from wherever he was seeking one from in Deutschland. Last I heard he was expecting a call back from a shop, but that was weeks ago.
#379
GT3 player par excellence
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#382
Not following this GT4 forum, I missed but just now stumbled onto this thread.
I was at NOLA in 5/14 for what I believe was the 2nd East series GT4 Clubsport races. There was lots of carnage. I started volunteering for SCCA in 1984, raced 1993-2007, and have been doing D.E.s ever since. In all those events over all those years I had never witnessed not 1 but 2 shock tower failures in one weekend on the same type of car. The first one was what looked like a minor left front to right rear collision, the kind where you just yank the fender off the tire and get back out. But the frump lid was open and holy crap, there was a gaping split about half way around the top of the shock tower. Later, another car hit a tire wall on the right side, went up in the air, and came down hard. That one looked pretty rough. But what was again shocking was that the left shock tower was similarly split. But not only that, where the front inner fender structure met the firewall the seam was also split about a foot.
At the time I wondered if attaching a tube from the cage to the shock tower took out all flexibility, rendering the top of the tower rigid, and a hit to the wheel put too much stress on the lower part of the tower, and something had to give. Now I see that these towers are failing over bumps on the street. Something's bad wrong w/ that.
I was at NOLA in 5/14 for what I believe was the 2nd East series GT4 Clubsport races. There was lots of carnage. I started volunteering for SCCA in 1984, raced 1993-2007, and have been doing D.E.s ever since. In all those events over all those years I had never witnessed not 1 but 2 shock tower failures in one weekend on the same type of car. The first one was what looked like a minor left front to right rear collision, the kind where you just yank the fender off the tire and get back out. But the frump lid was open and holy crap, there was a gaping split about half way around the top of the shock tower. Later, another car hit a tire wall on the right side, went up in the air, and came down hard. That one looked pretty rough. But what was again shocking was that the left shock tower was similarly split. But not only that, where the front inner fender structure met the firewall the seam was also split about a foot.
At the time I wondered if attaching a tube from the cage to the shock tower took out all flexibility, rendering the top of the tower rigid, and a hit to the wheel put too much stress on the lower part of the tower, and something had to give. Now I see that these towers are failing over bumps on the street. Something's bad wrong w/ that.
#383
Rennlist Member
Not following this GT4 forum, I missed but just now stumbled onto this thread.
I was at NOLA in 5/14 for what I believe was the 2nd East series GT4 Clubsport races. There was lots of carnage. I started volunteering for SCCA in 1984, raced 1993-2007, and have been doing D.E.s ever since. In all those events over all those years I had never witnessed not 1 but 2 shock tower failures in one weekend on the same type of car. The first one was what looked like a minor left front to right rear collision, the kind where you just yank the fender off the tire and get back out. But the frump lid was open and holy crap, there was a gaping split about half way around the top of the shock tower. Later, another car hit a tire wall on the right side, went up in the air, and came down hard. That one looked pretty rough. But what was again shocking was that the left shock tower was similarly split. But not only that, where the front inner fender structure met the firewall the seam was also split about a foot.
At the time I wondered if attaching a tube from the cage to the shock tower took out all flexibility, rendering the top of the tower rigid, and a hit to the wheel put too much stress on the lower part of the tower, and something had to give. Now I see that these towers are failing over bumps on the street. Something's bad wrong w/ that.
I was at NOLA in 5/14 for what I believe was the 2nd East series GT4 Clubsport races. There was lots of carnage. I started volunteering for SCCA in 1984, raced 1993-2007, and have been doing D.E.s ever since. In all those events over all those years I had never witnessed not 1 but 2 shock tower failures in one weekend on the same type of car. The first one was what looked like a minor left front to right rear collision, the kind where you just yank the fender off the tire and get back out. But the frump lid was open and holy crap, there was a gaping split about half way around the top of the shock tower. Later, another car hit a tire wall on the right side, went up in the air, and came down hard. That one looked pretty rough. But what was again shocking was that the left shock tower was similarly split. But not only that, where the front inner fender structure met the firewall the seam was also split about a foot.
At the time I wondered if attaching a tube from the cage to the shock tower took out all flexibility, rendering the top of the tower rigid, and a hit to the wheel put too much stress on the lower part of the tower, and something had to give. Now I see that these towers are failing over bumps on the street. Something's bad wrong w/ that.
Still think this should be a sticky. I don't care if it only happens to a few cars: It happens more often than it does for other sports cars, so it's a problem, and the results are pretty catastrophic when it does happen. Importance = problem probability multiplied by problem severity. So really bad issues that happen often are most important, followed by both small issues that happen often and large catastrophic issues that happen rarely, but more than they should (this is the latter). Only small issues that happen rarely are unimportant. Eh, probably not worth arguing over though, rant off.
#386
Rennlist Member
There's no need for two sticky threads for transmission failures, which are covered under warranty. However, it makes sense that this thread is a sticky—at least until this potential $30,000 (?) unibody failure mode is understood. Wonder how it got unstickied with no explanation? Because two members (or users?) said it should?
If the repair bills are being pushed to insurance, guess who will really pay the bill?
#387
Rennlist Member
I saw another one happen out at Thunderhill a month or two back. I picked up the strut tower brackets like in the Clubsports from PMNA for some peace of mind.
#389
#390
Rennlist Member
+1