Think! Always wear a seatbelt!

[Lomster]

Originally Posted by Darrin

All the reinforcement I need for wearing a seatbelt is seen in racing. Granted they were an advanced version of one, but they are doing advanced forms of driving.

If the pros use them, I certainly am not one to argue...

I read an article in New Scientist, years ago, about the stresses and strains drivers get subject to. Nelson Piquet (Sr), just after he left F1 and went into Indy Car stacked a car at full tils into the track side wall. Consider this track wall is a 1m high and 1m thick strip of reinforced concrete buried over 1m into the ground. tt was calculated he spiked momentarily at over 100G. And then walked away with no discernable injuries.

Just think if he'd *not* been wearing a seatbelt, he might be landing just about ........... now! Although I reckon his eye-balls might have picked up the dirt off the inside of his visor and his ball-balls might have knocked against the steering column.

(BTW This is Faysh not Lom, she doesn't read NS )

[Mark]

Originally Posted by Dymetrie

I contest this.

I would assume a seatbelt would give a slightly less concussive/abrupt deceleration than a steering wheel, which would also give the organs more time to slow down, and therefore less risk of damage.

As for airbags, they are designed to be used with a seatbelt, and the timing is critical - hit them too early and they'll still be in the inflation phase, which due to proximity would be worse than the steering wheel (this is adequately demonstrated by an airbag's tendency to turn incorrectly fitted child seats into projectiles).

[TinkerBell]

I agree with Mark, also if you are wearing a seatbelt, your body isn't going to have as much movement if it is wearing a seatbelt to not wearing one, so therefore the organs aren't shook about as much. Plus a seatbelt pulls you tight to the chair so everything will be squashed together with it less likely to break your ribs and what not.

[Pheebs]

I was wondering whether it was a good marketing ploy to get people debating about it?

Don't know!

Still, people who don't where seat belts are numptys!

[Desmo]

A seatbelt will slow you down much slower than a steering wheel

[lostkat]

Exactly! Plus, the worse affected part by the seatbelt when you're in an accident is usually your shoulder, not further down. Seatbelts have a little give in them before they pull tight and that's just enough to cushion the impact.

Given the choice I'd much rather have a sore shoulder than hit the steering wheel/ windscreen in an accident.

I do believe that airbags going off at low speeds are more trouble than they're worth though. Mine burnt my face and didn't really do anything else (apart from being the factor which wrote off the car) because I was barely moving at the time.

[Will]

Your body or more accurately your internal organs will not have the time to build up the momentum to cause as much damage to themselves whilst wearing a seatbelt. Though people do suffer ruptured spleens whilst even wearing seatbelts from even low speed shunts and often collapse a couple of days later even though they were "ok". Our internal organs are incredible resilient but also can be incredibly fragile. I'm guilty of not always wearing my seatbelt, but I've become a lot better at doing it - pre-tensioners and airbags can help, and categorically DO help, however they are not to be relied on. Back in the early days of motoring etc... it was thought that being thrown from the car was safer!

[Streeteh]

It's more to do with the fact that a seatbelt does stretch slightly under huge amounts of pressure, this in effect cushions the blow and instead of internal injuries you just get a huge nasty bruise.

[Psymonkee]

How bloody crap do you have to be at driving (in a residential area no less) to hit something at what I assume was 30mph absolutely bang on?

Nothing to do with seatbelts 'killing Richard', stupidity and lack of attention did

[Lopez]

Originally Posted by Lomster

Nelson Piquet (Sr), just after he left F1 and went into Indy Car stacked a car at full tils into the track side wall. Consider this track wall is a 1m high and 1m thick strip of reinforced concrete buried over 1m into the ground. tt was calculated he spiked momentarily at over 100G. And then walked away with no discernable injuries.

(BTW This is Faysh not Lom, she doesn't read NS )

That accident?



From what I remember that resulted in serious leg injuries and concussion, he didn't exactly walk away