Bonnet clips

[Langdale Forest]

Ford needs to design some better bonnet clips because they cost Hirvonen a chance of winning the championship. Hirvonen could just have won the championship if it was not for the bonnet clip coming undone.


The people who designed the bonnet clips for the Ford Focus WRC have the brain the size of a grape and the attention span of a rock!!!!!!!!!! :mad:

[bluuford]

It is not the first time. 2003 Acropolis rally, do you remember that. Markko Märtin drove over 20 km with open bonnet and lost something like 6 seconds and still won that rally. But the new focus does have much worse design of the bonnet and it is much harder to drive your bonnet open :-)

[Langdale Forest]

I remember that but he still drove on to win the rally!
Shame Markko Martin is no longer in the WRC.

[Mihai]

Here's the video clip of the Markko Martin hood incident. He seems little disturbed by the fact that his vision narrowed by 90% :D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uacmcFOL_Rs

Indeed, it's a shame that Markko is not rallying anymore.

How about a footage of Mikko's hood incident ?

[SubaruNorway]

It happend with Henning in Australia too, luckely on a flat straight so it flew off. Wasen't there someone else too?

[Mihai]

Good point, here is Henning with his bonnet flipping on the right side of the car:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwuD-tzxcnw

[Mihai]

Here's another hood mishap from a local rally in Ireland :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yj5yscYA0mM

Circuit racers ar no strangers to hoods blown open either:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsfLv0WdanQ

Not to mention drag racers too :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puNYfz4fdOY

[Langdale Forest]

Lol the mirror fell off.

[JFL]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOJp6lRIdGY
Its possible to drive with the bonnet up.. Just look at this drama.. ;)

[J4MIE]

If you land like this after a jump it does not help...

http://photos-c.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs242.snc1/8921_308789670611_529115611_9587968_6410042_n.jpg

However I've not heard or seen anything about it really. I just think he tried that bit too hard which ended up costing him, though of course he didn't have a choice...

Maybe it was crew error before the stage?

[MartijnS]

Just saw the footage at Eurosport. He landed straight on the nose, the front of the car got a big hit and the bonnet come loose at the top. This had nothing to do with the bonnet clips, but just the major impact after the landing.

[Allyc85]

Agreed, he just tired too hard and carried too much speed over the jump. Fair play to him though because he never gave up and was easily the fastest in front of us around Walters Arena 2, even with the title being nigh on over.

[BDunnell]

I'm not sure I'd have expected the clips to withstand an impact like that. It was quite a violent landing and I thought Hirvonen did very well to keep control. Good on him for pushing so hard.

[Juha_Koo]

It happend with Henning in Australia too, luckely on a flat straight so it flew off. Wasen't there someone else too?

Actually in Australia Henning's bonnet didn't fly off. But in Sardinia it did. ;)

[J4MIE]

This is the same jump in 2006: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qOplzLwj7Y

[Langdale Forest]

When I sais the disigners had the brains the size of grapes, I did because they probably did not have the intelligence to realize that cars land very hard after big jumps, as what happend to Mikko hirvonen yesterday morning.

[bretddog]

I thought the latest Focus bonnet top hinge was not really fixed, but designed to make the bonnet fly off if the front clips released... ?

Haven't we seen this a few times? Latvala once this season I think.

Perhaps that design made it also weaker, and may be part of the cause for this incident..

[N.O.T]

can we have a thread for every little detail that goes wrong in every single rally car possible ?? it will help tremendusly....especially now that we enter a rally dead 3 months period...

Are you for real my friend? you actually sat down and thought that you must post a thread like that ???when extreme ocassions occur like that jump its normal that some parts will fail....

why ? why ? why ?

[Camelopard]

can we have a thread for every little detail that goes wrong in every single rally car possible ?? it will help tremendusly....especially now that we enter a rally dead 3 months period...

Are you for real my friend? you actually sat down and thought that you must post a thread like that ???when extreme ocassions occur like that jump its normal that some parts will fail....

why ? why ? why ?

Any reason you insist on replying with your continuing nonsense to every single thread.

why ? why ? why ?

I shouldn't have taken you off 'ignore', easily fixed though! :)

[noel157]

can we have a thread for every little detail that goes wrong in every single rally car possible ?? it will help tremendusly....especially now that we enter a rally dead 3 months period...

Are you for real my friend? you actually sat down and thought that you must post a thread like that ???when extreme ocassions occur like that jump its normal that some parts will fail....

why ? why ? why ?

+1.

[User]

Didn't Loeb loose his bonnet in Sweden last year or before?

[raybak]

can we have a thread for every little detail that goes wrong in every single rally car possible ?? it will help tremendusly....especially now that we enter a rally dead 3 months period...

Are you for real my friend? you actually sat down and thought that you must post a thread like that ???when extreme ocassions occur like that jump its normal that some parts will fail....

why ? why ? why ?

My Rally car was crying at the last event, is that enough :(

Looked good at the speccy point though with oil coming out below the headlights.

Ray

[Mihai]

Can anyone provide me a link to a bigger version of this photo ?

http://i38.tinypic.com/30rtytd.jpg

I found it 800x600 a few years ago, but I lost the picture and I can't remember where I saw it in the first place.

[ProRally]

Maybe Loriaux wanted to save 2 grams on the bonnet pins :D :D :D

[Langdale Forest]

Then he has a brain the size of a GRAPE!

[cali]

Then he has a brain the size of a GRAPE!

Sure, can You imagine what he has squeezed out of it to design so many successful rallycars over the years. Cannot imagine how small Your brain is then :D

PS! Ford is problably using some standard bonnet clips from supplier.

[N.O.T]

do you actually believe that Ford makes their own bonnet pins and they don;t get them from an external supplier ????

and if you watch the video carefully the bonnet pins didn;t fail....the bonnet failed from its base not from the pins...

[J.Lindstroem]

Cannot imagine how small Your brain is then :D

+1

[Mihai]

And it's not the supplier's fault if you forget to lock the bonnet pins. http://i57.photobucket.com/albums/g202/gr8link/orn/00.gif

If interested, a video compilation of bonnet-related incidents, mainly in motorsports:
http://www.topgear.ro/blog/2009/10/sus-capota-ca-mi-intra-soarele-n-ochi/

[cali]

Exactly, it has happened before and will happen again due to different reasons. Even without grapes not being involved :p

[Langdale Forest]

Sure, can You imagine what he has squeezed out of it to design so many successful rallycars over the years. Cannot imagine how small Your brain is then :D

.


Well I don't think you have ever designed a WRC car? :uhoh:

[Langdale Forest]

+1

:mad: Some people might say that about you!

[J.Lindstroem]

:mad: Some people might say that about you!

I just said +1. :S

[Langdale Forest]

Maybe what you said is true.

[Hartusvuori]

It seems it'll be hell of a long three months on the forum until Rally Sweden ...

[Langdale Forest]

That gives more time for Ford to make some better clips!!!!

It's what this thread is all about.

[TMorel]

and maybe Mikko can practice not landing it on the nose and breaking things.

Also, did you see how badly the paint scratched and ruined Jari-Matti's rally in Portugal, perhaps Ford need to look at that too.

[noel157]

Cannot imagine how small Your brain is then:.

+1

[Langdale Forest]

Pointless comments.

[J.Lindstroem]

Pointless comments.

+1

[Helstar]

-5


... and we're all even ^^

[Langdale Forest]

Apart from a few people.

[Langdale Forest]

+ 2 at every post then

[cali]

Well I don't think you have ever designed a WRC car? :uhoh:
Well, i'm not the one who rants here about the brains of the size of a grape neither. You just do not get it ???

[Macd]

Just to get back on topic. You cannot blame anyone for what happened to Miko. The car jumped nose first and broke the pins. The force involved was obviously higher than what the pins could take. You cannot expect every component of a car to be bulletproof because we would all just be rallying tanks.

[Langdale Forest]

A good point but hirvonen will not accept that.

[Macd]

A good point but hirvonen will not accept that.

He will never accept anything. You never do when you lose. But that is the truth. You really want Ford to make the bonnet pins out of diamonds?

[Langdale Forest]

Diamonds would not work, but i think GRAPES would!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[kolvas]

I´m not sure what the bonnet clips on the Ford is made of but when I orderd mine I had a hard time finding some in steel, almost every manufacture is now making them in aluminium and they can´t stand half the impact that the ones made of steel do, I´ve experinced that on my own thats why I will never fit aluminium ones on my rallycar

[DonJippo]

I thought the latest Focus bonnet top hinge was not really fixed, but designed to make the bonnet fly off if the front clips released... ?

Yes the bonnet is designed so that it should fly off in such case but this time it just did not happen and they had to stop the car and take it off by hand.

[bretddog]

Yes the bonnet is designed so that it should fly off in such case but this time it just did not happen and they had to stop the car and take it off by hand.
Sure, it requires both clips to break/release at the same time. Still i would say the design is somewhat successfull. If we look at the statistics, allthough the sample size is really small, at least up to now this design has had 2-3 successfull fly-offs (if not more), with only one unsuccessfull event. Just unfortunate that it happen for the top driver in the most critical rally.. Obviously there should be better ways to secure the bonnet, but at least comparing the methods they (Ford) have tried so far, the latest seems to be the best.