Quote from Nathan_French_14 :

It's a pointless mod, which is a danger to pedestrians and looks stupid.

+1 on that. After all this Mazda looks quite nice, deadmau5 sticker is awesome on rear window

Quote from BAMBO :

God damn you snow!


So basically, there was a heatwave about a week ago which made me think I could pull away the car's cover So I did that, hoping to take her out for a spin during the weekend. Guess what?!? The following day, I looked outside the window and it was heavily snowing. Found her under a ton of snow. Here's a pic I took after I mopped the snow off her:


The snow persists up to this day, that's over a week!!! What makes it more annoying is that I am in my break between terms now, which means I have lots of spare time

Goddamn snow on airfilter. I also have to constantly keep brushing snow off from airfilter because the Cossie style bonnet has an airvent just above it.

Oh BTW I still want to see the stuff under the bonnet.

Quote from Nathan_French_14 :

Correct me if I am wrong, but I am pretty sure that when your Mazda was stock, it did not have a tow hook sticking out the front of the bumper?

That is our point. It's a pointless mod, which is a danger to pedestrians and looks stupid. Either way though, ignore us by all means. It's your car, so do as you wish.

Isn't modding anything pointless? Or rather.. isn't buying just about anything pointless? Do computers really need the processing power and 8gb of ram these days just so someone can check their email?

It's not like I drive around to run over people like I live in grand theft auto or something, jesus; I'm pretty sure my car as a whole is more dangerous than something 2 inches around.

If you hate it, that's fine, you don't have to point out to me 500 times that it's dangerous.. everything about a car is dangerous.

If you want to keep going about what all is illegal about my car, lets talk about single reverse light I'm pretty sure isn't the most legal in the US, or how about the clear reflectors in the rear which I know is illegal, and soon the reflectors in the headlight housing will be gone. Pretty sure my car exceeds the dB level noise pollution in a lot of areas (which really my car isn't that loud).. honestly I could keep this list going if you want.. but it doesn't matter, it's all pointless right?

I'm about to get all artsy on you and shit but whatever, i'll stick with laymens terms though; It's there to uneven the car; same as the vinyl on the rear; symmetry isn't attractive to humans. It's also red to bring your eye around the car, the taillights are red, the calipers are red, and the tow hook is red too to allow you to follow the red around to the front, otherwise all the red leads you to nowhere, you're just stuck on the sides and back.. if that makes any sense.. if not then don't worry, but that's my reason for it being there.

@Psycho I don't think I've ever seen plastic bull gaurds before; not in the states, that's for sure.

it looks nice, and is really the least if your concerns if you get hit by a car..i think id care more about the car's weight then a little metal that sticks out a half inch

if you get hit by the bumper, it will give a quarter inch, cause its designed to hit other cars, not a lightweight human.

if you walk into it and you get more then a bruise, you have osteoperosis, need calcium, or need muscles.

i see cars and trucks (mainly trucks) with all metal bumpers, and sometimes boxed steel bumpers, that are basically the same thing, only much bigger, and sharper. should those trucks get burned, or drive around with no bumpers?

i thought this was a forum filled with car people, not a forum filled with safety offocials

Quote from XCNuse :

@Psycho I don't think I've ever seen plastic bull gaurds before; not in the states, that's for sure.

They are all the range with most SUVs. Generally come as factory options.

@Nuse: have you heard about that the us goverment wants to stop modding your car(not only your car )? They are trying to do anything about it. its all over the car magazines.

nuh uh, I don't get any car magazines of any sort, I hadn't heard about any of that, I'm not surprised, they are always trying to complain. Next we will be wearing a uniform, and become socialists.

@psycho, okay OEM ones are like practically standard here and painted or not, I have never seen a rover with that on the front before though that I can recall.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RR5p5grn72A

It is fun to mess around in an empty parking lot.

well.... not actually my car but i do drive it very often

And thats a great reason why FWD cars are boring as ****.

I know, but hey! its what i have, i cant complain.

Quote from logitekg25 :

i think id care more about the car's weight then a little metal that sticks out a half inch

if you get hit by the bumper, it will give a quarter inch, cause its designed to hit other cars, not a lightweight human.

A little piece of metal that sticks out is like a spear tip, it pierces rather than distributing the force, like a bull bar.

And bumpers ARE primarily designed to hit people. The stuff behind them (strengthening beams, deflector beams, etc.) is for collisions with more rigid objects (other cars, walls, trees, ...)

Quote from XCNuse :

@psycho, okay OEM ones are like practically standard here and painted or not, I have never seen a rover with that on the front before though that I can recall.

Right, might be a regional thing still. I know in Aus plastic bullbars are becoming more popular and in the EU OEM has to be of the plastic verity, although you can still buy metal bullbars if you want one. Just car makers aren't allowed to sell them.

Quote from BigPeBe :

Goddamn snow on airfilter. I also have to constantly keep brushing snow off from airfilter because the Cossie style bonnet has an airvent just above it.

Oh BTW I still want to see the stuff under the bonnet.

I can live with brushing the snow off the air filter but what really gets me is the small bits that freeze and get stuck to it. There's no wining with them. You either try and take them off at the risk of removing them with bits of air filter stuck to them or you leave them on and get that paranoid feeling that humidity will harm your engine. The only option I can think of is to take a hair dryer and use it to melt the ice but I'm not that desperate.....yet

And I will post a vid showcasing the engine. It just has to be warmer outside because right now I can't be bothered to lift the bonnet by myself. It's a bit of a handful to manoeuvre it around that air filter

Hah I think you should wrap some kind of protection around it.

Quote from BigPeBe :

Hah I think you should wrap some kind of protection around it.

That's what she said.

Sorry, had to.

Quote from morpha :

And bumpers ARE primarily designed to hit people. The stuff behind them (strengthening beams, deflector beams, etc.) is for collisions with more rigid objects (other cars, walls, trees, ...)

Beings that I work in the R&D department of one of the leading plastics manufacturer in the world and we produce "bumpers" for 80% of the automotive manufacturers for the North American market, I'll let you know that you are completely wrong here.

They are primarily designed to obtain minimal damage to the vehicle in collisions of 3 mph or less. I would hazard a guess that much is the same in the European market as well.

Quote :

One key area still challenging engineers in most U.S. vehicles is the front bumper. For vehicles in Europe and Asia (where there are many more pedestrian collisions and governmental standards regulating them), bumpers are designed with larger crush space and with different supports for the plastic bumper cover in order to reduce leg injury. Unfortunately, these "softer" bumpers don't perform well in the 5-mph bumper test conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) to assess repair costs, so they generally aren't used on vehicles in the U.S.

http://www.edmunds.com/car-saf ... rough-vehicle-design.html

Interesting. Did not know that.
€: To clarify, I meant I didn't know that the U.S. doesn't have strict pedestrian safety rules.

Quote from Nathan_French_14 :

Correct me if I am wrong, but I am pretty sure that when your Mazda was stock, it did not have a tow hook sticking out the front of the bumper?

That is our point. It's a pointless mod, which is a danger to pedestrians and looks stupid. Either way though, ignore us by all means. It's your car, so do as you wish.

I'm planning on reinforcing my front bumper with some steel bars. If you step in front of my car, you deserve to get hurt.

Quote from morpha :

http://www.edmunds.com/car-saf ... rough-vehicle-design.html

Interesting. Did not know that.
€: To clarify, I meant I didn't know that the U.S. doesn't have strict pedestrian safety rules.

judging by my experience walking around in the us they dont really need to ether
for one thing there arent any pedestrians to begin with for another if american drivers see you walking around on the street they just stop dead apparently dumbfolded that its actually possible to use your legs to walk around and wait for you to get off the road (which i massively disorienting when youre used to walking between lanes in traffic waiting for an opening to cross another lane)

Quote from morpha :

http://www.edmunds.com/car-saf ... rough-vehicle-design.html

Interesting. Did not know that.
€: To clarify, I meant I didn't know that the U.S. doesn't have strict pedestrian safety rules.

That never makes sense as it was the US market that stopped the use of chrome bumpers so we all switched to tacky plastic ones (ruined a lot of 70's vehicles) as they were safer for pedestrians. If you buy an Evo X in Europe/Asia it has a exposed cross beam in front of the rad, but to buy the same vehicle in the US/Canada it has to be wrapped in rubber.

Unless it is one rule for them (imports) and one rule for us (domestic), which wouldn't surprise me. I do find it comical that the US regulations put cost of repairing a vehicle before the cost of someone's legs.

truth behind it is people rarely get hit by cars here...that sounds right too..even in the most crowded cities people stick to crosswalks, and sidewalks

Talked to Pete today at BC Racing; coilovers have been submitted and will be built here soon (since it's a special order). Process won't start for another week or so though since their factory is off for Chinese New Years.


As far as pedestrians and bumpers go.. I would say that majority (well over 90%) of car designers & engineers today don't really take pedestrians into account when designing the front bumper (except for mercedes.. because they care for some reason.. I think that says something about what they think of their drivers [note.. a car that also can track if you 'accidentally' run outside a lane, it corrects you]). Pretty sure they focus far more on aerodynamics and air flow into the engine than running over people.

Now; that doesn't go to say yes there have been thousands upon thousands of tests of cars running into pedestrians, but thanks to all of those tests, it has probably become a second nature thing to design a bumper that is easier on a pedestrian than before those tests.

Actually the shape of modern cars (smooth and round) is due to a lot of legislation that demands a car should be soft when a pedestrian impacts it. Because they had to do away with the sharp angular designs (that is why pop-ups were first stopped) the best way to get a good aero package and still meet the legislation was to make the cars rounded almost balloon in nature.

Even the bonnet and all of the components under it are carefully designed so should someone find themselves using it as a landing pad the bonnet will disipate the energy and there will be nothing hard (like a cylinder head) under the more likely areas of impact that'll do damage to the ped. It is also why deploying bonnets are taking off with the big marquees, it is essentially a ped airbag. Very useful if you can't get the right amount of space between deformable panels in the bonnet and solid items.

Getting hit by a car, no matter how much you try to sugar coat it, its not going to be ****ing safe. It is a fast moving 1.5ton hunk of metal with wheels.

I'll be the first to say i couldn't give two shits if i got hit by a car with a protruding tow hook, because i believe i'd have much bigger problems.

IE; my head smashing into the windshield at 60kph

http://www.ind-distribution.com/images/R-11

this is safer than a tow hook or tow eye, and it still serves its purpose