Fire Safety

Dale lots of info can be had from the SFI which will lead you to more good info. Some quick comments that 10 sec sfi 3a/5 is for 2nd degree burn and adding underwear extends the time greatly and you can still buy more suit in a /10, /15 etc but they get hotter and heavier. Fuel cells are often not as safe as an OEM tank because I see them improperly installed all the time and improperly maintained. We are not engineers. OEMS go to great lengths to engineer, do FEA, computer simulate crash tests, and finally real world crash tests and still sometimes there are NSTA recalls. We home builders or race shop with no skills other than "doing it for 40 years" with small sample sizes go ahead and use industry best practices and put in fuel cells. An example is the dale earnhardt jr C5 corvette fire where the fuel cell install was of poor design on a very well funded professional car where someone dis not think of all the possible failure points and sure enough we almost had a burnt dale earnhardt Jr.. Then there is the fuel cell itself with issues like the bladders which are supposed to be stored dry and cycled out in 5 years. Cell makers have programs and certification labels for cells that are properly maintained and some race orgs. require it. You get a nice old hard bladder and have an impact and the containment of that goes right out the window. You mount a cell badly and displace it in a crash and rip the fuel lines from the cell case and your safety goes to zero. There is so much thought that needs to be given when using cells. How many cells do you see with frangible hose joints? I have never seen them used but I would not own a cell without them.

Fire suppression is a must. Some feel that the 10lb FFF foam is the best but not adequate for a fuel cell fire so forget about protecting cells. IMO the goal is to protect the driver so he can get out. Secondary nozzle the engine compartment because that you can sometimes save. Caution on using more than 3 nozzles per 10lb fire bottle. FFF is safe you humans halon is not. Halon blows away and does not prevent re-ignitions. Suppression sytems buy you time just like the suit does. I don't consider it a tool to safe your car...it is too small. But sometimes in small fires that is all you need.

For those who converted streetcars to racecars aka tintops don't leave around orphan wiring. They can often come unwrapped and cause electrical fires. keep your car clean of excess oils and oily grunge that is fuel for a fire. That includes keeping your race suit clean and not oily. You should not be fixing your car in your race suit. That is a recipe for suit failure. Practice car exit with eyes closed both exiting from the driver's side and to the passenger side. That is one big reason to stik to certified SFI and FIA gear. They have specs for things like rollcage padding that will not drip hot melting foam on you in a fire, certified right side nets have release buckles as do left side window nets. Head and neck restraints are single release with the harness cam or latch. All that is there for a reason. Hope that gives you a glimpse. Your post could be 6+ very long threads.

 

+1

I'm out of touch with the current rules etc, but do know that a break-away valve is mandated between the cell & the motor for formula cars at least - Idea being if the ass end gets ripped off the valve separates and seals.

I guess different problems apply to tintops, but I still like the idea of my fuel lines not leaking......

Cheers,
Ian

 

Very well said.
Remember that all the safety equipment that you put in your car is there for one reason. To get you through an "event" in one piece so you can come back another day to play.

Bill

 

1. Age of six-point harness. SFI belts are 2 years. FIA polyester is 5 year until they expire

2. Check harness mounting bolts. Mounts should be double shear joints and use grade 8 hardware or metric 10.9 but many say grade 5 is OK. That may be true but we already have an extremely difficult time with counterfeit (especially grade 8) hardware so just try and use better hardware over all and buy it from a known source like aircraft spruce and specialty who supply aircraft and that stuff needs to be certified.

3. Who made the fuel cell and are they a rep builder (I suspect yes, but it doesn't hurt to check.)? Does it matter how old the fuel cell is? Cell bladder 5 years = replace. same with interior bladder foam. The cell can be custom made or an off the shelf "can" like from ATL or "Fuel safe" and should last forever as it really just holds the bladder and is designed to take the crush of impact and not puncture the bladder. The bladder holds the fuel. Most do not make cellls. They buy cell with bladder and add pumps, roll over valves dry breaks etc. and weld structures around the can to hold the can in the desired location.

4. I know the fuel cell is mounted in the trunk. Are they typically bolted in? Does welding help? There are usually welded supports and final bolted frame pieces for final retention so that the cell can be serviced/removed for service.

5. Check the fuel cell fittings for the flexible kind. Not flexible frangible (break away). They are not exactly easy to find nor cheap but good ones will leak less than an oz when the line is severed from the cell. So in a big impact that breaks the line from cell you don't have a gas bath. Check aircraft suppliers for these kinds of fittings in typical AN designations

6. Check the age of the bladder and replace if several years old. 5 years.

7. Check into fire suppression for the driver and the engine well. ESS is nice because they are trackside user rechargable. People love "safecraft" but I have had two failures with their AAA foam tanks. 1- mounting feet breaking away from tank = projectile in your car in a crash and 2- corroded gauge stuck in green zone so you think your tank is fully charged when it may not be.

8. Check padding and window restraints. rollcage padding needs to be SFI 45.1 brand does not matter. Windownets/right side nets with quick release latches. Make sure the design of the windownet rod is such that it can't be bent and slip out of its locked position and impale you in an impact.

9. Practice getting out. My car comes with a top, but I'll probably leave it off. Top off means you need to wear arm restraints so have those restraint attachments sewn into your race suit.

One other thing to consider, I'm guessing, is that this car has only run in professional series and, thus, does not have a log book and has never been inspected by NASA or SCCA.

Well the pro MX5 org teched the car to that standard which usually is better than or = to SCCA/NASA but tech is more than safety it is legality for the class you race too. So pick your class for SCCA or NASA and read the GCR to find out what is required for car safety, driver safety equipment and car requirements like cells OK or all roofs on when on-track etc. You may need to modify your car to fit into a class and then modify more to be competitive in a class. If the pro car has too much horsepower you might need to restrict it down or not be allowed in a class despite having the right car if you have the wrong engine. So read the rules!

With SCCA if the car has no logbook when you go to your first tech they will inspect the car and stamp the cage and issue a logbook if the car passes and issue "an annual tech".
Then you will need to pass a gear check like do you have an sfi 38.1 legal head and neck restraint and fireproof socks? They put a annual sticker on your helmet and your gear is good for 1 year too. Then you sign up for an event. They check your annual tech sign off and look at your helmet sticker. Then they stamp your logbook for the race you sign up for as "OK to race" and you go have fun.

 

Problem is, all the fire safety equipment in the world won't stop the freak accidents, and those are usually the ones that kill people, and as most folks here know, I lost a good friend to a racing fire accident going on 13 years ago now.

My observations are you can never have too much personal fire safety, but if it gets doused with fuel, you quite literally are, toast. My friend had the best of everything, it didn't save him, what killed him was the unprepared 'fire' crew.

You can have a great fire suppression system, it will work perfectly - as long as you are parked and intact when it goes off, but as soon as you smack a wall, get t-boned, rear-ended or roll, those accurately pointed nozzles won't be pointing where they should be any longer. That is also what happened to my friend.

The best thing that can happen is to have several crews located around a circuit with multiple BIG self-contained bottles of 'Purple K', that is the only thing you can deploy fast enough for a HIGH-OCTANE fuel fire. Argue all you want about AAA Foam, you will never be able to deploy it in time to save anyone in a racing accident, I've never seen it save anyone in a racing accident, when I have seen it it was used long past when it was needed.

You don't need gloves to 'pat down flames' - that's just a stupid thought (sorry - being honest) - you need a thick suit and gloves that will allow you to feel the steering while driving but also buy you about 15 seconds to get out of a car, if you can. If you can't, no suit will buy you more than 20 seconds TOPS, I don't care what they say. And 20 is pushing it, it's really more like 17-18 seconds. You will never be able to 'pat down' flames, unless someone lights a piece of paper on fire and throws it at you. If you have to pat a fire down while sitting in a car, you're toast, cuz those flames won't get any smaller.

PS - in light of my thoughts above, and everyone else's thoughts, the best thing you can do is practice getting out of the car FAST, over and over, undoing the belts, doing everything blindfolded, and really, maybe practicing it with one arm tied behind your back. Really. If you have a broken arm it is useless.

 

Your post is 100% true but there is so much you can do to mitigate the risk. Who you race with is very important because you depend on those people for your life. I have a huge respect for my local SCCA. They keep me safe and the professionalism of these flaggers and extraction teams are so good the pros use our guys for LBGP every year. Trackside our GCR's spell out the safety crews needed right down to trackside ACLS and M.D. medical director who has final sign off before racing begins. Last month I raced at CoTA and that branch of SCCA was amazingly clueless. Flaggers had no clue and extraction teams had no clue. The first thing I said to my crew was you don't want to get hurt here. That was a weekend that 7/10ths was a good idea. We don't come to race 7/10ths but "live to fight another day" is just plain smart. No one is paying us to race and take risks.

I landed on my roof once in a 348 racecar. It had oem tanks and fully working oem fuel system. I left it that way because I did not think I could engineer this system better than Ferrari and the NTSA/federal requirements. I was right. My car was on its roof long after I crawled out of it and not a drop of gas spilled. There have been all kinds of problems with the best equipment. I have had safecraft gauges fail. OMP stopped all production one year while they redesigned a hardening flop tube problem in their bottles. That is doing some research and mitigating risk. My vette hold like 15G of fuel and I need ballast to make weight. I can ballast with fuel but it is safer to put the amount of fuel you need +10% and ballast up with lead. I have never seen a "tintop" rulebook that mandated frangible fuel fittings. I would use them anyway despite the extra work and cost. The "best" of everything still does not make up for common sense and engineering. The C5R vette racecar that dale earnhart jr almost burned in had the best of everything except a firewall they never thought they needed or a way to deal with excess fuel left between the drybreak and the fuel cell. The LG motorsports C6R driving by Boris Said at Long Beach also had the best of everything but someone designed the fuel line in a location that a simple non-threatening bumper tap pushed the exhaust into the fuel line burning the car and giving Boris Said the hotfoot. Even in the pros with best of everything there is still thinking like checkers instead of like chess. The best ATL fuel cell is a great thing but it still must be maintained on time with supple bladder and in date foam. Kill switches and fuel pump kills and rollover vent valves all that little stuff can be the difference between life and death. We can do a lot to mitigate risk but yes ***** happens.

 

Dale,

You can have problems anywhere. It is all about appreciation of risk. Amazingly a lot of people get hurt or die fishing!

"Chance favors the prepared mind" sort of applies here. Remember that COTA race I was at with the BEST amateur drivers in the country? Was this avoidable?

Dubros Motorsports JJ at COTA OOPS!!!!!! - YouTube
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Laurel and Hardy Racing School
Image Unavailable, Please Login
Image Unavailable, Please Login