Ok, so I was young. 1977 and I had a Ranault Dauphine, rear engine 1100cc and 3 speed box. Radiator was also in the rear so the front boot was
huge.
I was going to scrap the car and a mate arrived and we decided to take it to a new estate - this was in the western suburbs of Melbourne. There was
only bitumen roads, no houses. We started driving fast around bends to the point whereby the inside rear wheel lifted off the ground. The axle housing
was held up with material hoops.
So off with the hoops. Faster and faster we went. Eventually we were going so fast the rear inside wheel tucked right under the car. This made the car
shoot off in another direction but still couldnt roll the car.
I recall a Renault Gordini raced against Peter Brock in the "rally cross" of the early 1970's. That car often beat Brocky over the finish line- yeh
they were that good.
So was wondering two things....that I was stupid. Dont try it at home. and 2/ would other rear engine cars behave the same way eg Beetles and type
3???
By the way. We cut the roof off the car for giggles. Then wrecked a Renault 10 for its 4 speed box. didnt work well - had to wled the two different
main shafts together- but thats another story.
Dauphines rolled as easily as Beetles !
A bloke I knew [he ended up being Pete Geogeghan's mechanic] rolled his almost new Dauphine Gordini.....and it really folded up.
We were doing 60kph on a 90 degree bend. maybe not quick enough lol
anything with SA back then rolled pretty easy. Seen videos of races on the ring in the late 60s and nearly all the rear engine SA cars rolled
including those Renaults on one particular sharp bend. but all the 911s with IRS were fine.
Once IRS came out in the VW, I don't think rolling is a problem? I never been able to able to get any of my type 3s to go harry much, very stables
cars with IRS. Had bit of pendulum effect on sand roads and flying 80km/h around a 90ยบ sharpish bend coming on to a one lane bridge when damp, but it
was only minor and easy to correct.
But had driven few buggies and restored one with SA, yep! sure can see dying in one of those! I added limiting straps to my buggy after few incidents
car I managed to get closest to roll was a x series falcon, so much body roll on those, I reckon they would roll if you try hard enough.
VW powered Renault Dauphine at Warwick in 2008
Quite a popular conversion in Europe.
As someone who has been in a rollover and is a motorcyclist, I know there is nothing funny about crashes, but VWs are well represented in this
video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuYJx-4SiKc
The beetles in that vid roll at a drop of a hat. As well as those Renault lol.
Heres the full vids, a few IRS cars go arse over tits in there too.
Theres an Lbug in there so its obviously filmed after 1973
The number of people completely or partialy exiting those cars is amazing, good advert for wearing belts.
Out of all those crashes, most looked fine and just got out like nothing happen.
Quite a few years ago we had class with limited capacity production cars racing at the Old Bar roadside circuit they raced Hillman Imps,Morris Minors,the Renaults,Ford Anglias and quite a few others and I think that the only one that didn't flip at some stage was the Imp.One of the last races with these vehicles featured Max French's VW rally beetle fitted out with a 1600 twin carb engine and Herbie stripes,and it started from the back of the field and lapped most of the field. The track is a motorcycle track and at that stage was also used for go karts and TQ's.It was always an entertaining day at the bike track.
Quote: |
Quote: |
Nah, cut the roof off after trying to roll it.
looks like I didnt try hard enough to roll it. lol