APKhaos

Charles Espenlaub's suit and helmet were on display in the Sparco booth at PRI last December. His description of the fire event along with pics are in the April Grassroots Motorsports. Believe me, one look at his suit and helmet is enough to convince anyone to wear good safety gear. Charles makes the point that he would have been severely burned if he had a cotton t shirt [or cool shirt] under his suit. There's a lesson there.

ltc

My son has had very good success with Caracoat Iridium visors on his Arai helmets, with respect to glare reduction.
He even wears them in rain races when most other kids switch to a clear visor.

AFAIK, Caracoat in Japan is no longer in business, the last 2 I found were in Australia and they were shipped here.

ltc

Begin

The 95 968 Cabriolet is now living in Georgia.
I drove it down there and gave it to a friend as a surprise gift.
It has a good home.

End

gums

Whatever way you do your visor, be sure to drop it down if there's oil dry on the track. That stuff is nasty in the eyes!

DrJupeman

Yes, on and down.

Chaos

Closed but for 1/2 inch on first few laps and restarts. Then full open.

U4EEAH

VIP !!!!! If your car is equipped with drivers side air bag visor MUST be kept down or removed from helmet. Safety research has determined that when airbag deployment occurs, with the visor up, the bag gets caught on the visor and the inflation forces are directed into the helmet face opening causing serious eye injury.

Crazy Canuck

Visor down or open just a crack so it doesn't fog. Bought a tinted visor last year and prefer it to sunglasses. I've had chunks of rubber enter through the driver's window along with pebbles and sand.

No airbag. Harnesses & Hans. I have a cup wheel.

Flying Finn

I have the blue iridium visor and even though it's pretty dark, it's ok with clouds. Didn't use it at Night in Homestead though!

I never understood those who wear sunglasses, I much rather have tinted shield. For dark situations I have a clear visor, changing them takes a minute.

Seth Thomas

Visor down at all times with either a clear, iridium or tinted visor.

Charles was telling me that if he didn't have on his visor and a balaclava then he probably would not be telling us this story. After talking with Charles about his 25 Hour accident I definitely never ride in a racecar without full protection. That means firesuit, long underwear, socks, balaclava, shoes and gloves. This includes when I am coaching someone in a racecar or highly prepped track car. The simple reason is because you never know when something like this can happen.

Veloce Raptor

A big fat +1 on this. Same here.









Professional Racing and Driving Coach

M758

Rich,
We structure our season to run when it is cooler. We already have run 6 races this year. We have two more planned for April so 8 total before it gets warm in May. May is really the last time we can run normal race weekend as temperatures can be over 100F, but mostly are in the 90's. So warm, but not unbearable. The summer here get to 100+ with ease and the real issue is just being outside all day long when it get to 100F by 10am and stays that way until 8pm. In May it may get to over 100, but it is usally nice most of the day. Race time however is nearly always in the heat of the day. A cool suit works wornders at race time. I never run it practice or qualfying however as the 20 minute sessions are short enough that I can get by and I do over heat I can pull in.

So then we are off in June, July, August, but occasionaly run early morrning stuff from 5am to 11am just to be at the track. September is also hot and we can exepect temps in 100's. Octovber can be warm too, but by November we are back to nice again. So we have maybe 4 to 6 hot races in season.

RonCT

Joe Marko from HMS / Schroth importer gave a good safety discussion to us at CVR PCA last year (and years prior). His suggestion was pick one - either all the way open or off, or closed tight. Airbag was the reason given - that if you have an airbag and it goes off it can / will interfere with a partially open visor and cause damage to your face. It's amazing what sorts of junk comes flying in the window and some how hits your face (bugs, rocks, tire marbles, etc.). My "big" glasses protect my eyes. If I wore contacts, I'd have the visor buttoned down.

FredC

I have an iridium tinted visor for my GP-5 and it is badly stratched. Where can i find a GP-5 compatible iridium visor these days?

007DT

I always wore sunglasses and an open visor. Last weekend I tried to force myself to use the visor instead of the sunglasses. I, at times, had a hard time getting use to the different optics through the visor vs. sunglasses. Also I was a bit bothered by the lack of airflow, and noise by using the visor.

I guess it all take a bit of getting use to....