Nearly had a (potentially) very nasty smash the other day...
Nearly had a (potentially) very nasty smash the other day...
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Discussion

irocfan

Original Poster:

48,995 posts

219 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
well as it says above...

I was coming out of a small side road an audi tt went past and, with no other traffic on the road, I decided to boot it a little for some fun . So far so good, tail drifts ever so slightly out - this is fun, the car leaps forward catching to the audi so I let up off the throttle... and then it happens - I let off the throttle the car on the other hand has other ideas and it still on nearly full throttle and rapidly closing on the audi, stamp on the brakes still accelerating (though not as quickly) at this point the air isn't even blue as I'm too busy filling my pants! Foot now jammed on the brakes harder than I've ever pressed a peddle before I mange to knock the gearbox into neutral and then suddenly the revs die down to idle. Home is 1 mile away so I get home at a crawl (ready to knock into neutral asap) with no problems.

Cause of this potentially serious mishap? The over-mat had slipped off the tethering hook and the throttle peddle had wedged itself underneath

Moral of the story - CHECK THAT YOUR OVER-MATS ARE SECURE!!!!

Escort3500

13,471 posts

174 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Scary stuff eek

Bet the TT driver thought he'd blown you into the weeds smile

Sonic

4,008 posts

236 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
eek I can sympathise having had my S2 decide it wanted to carry on WOT when the throttle cam got stuck on the underside of the bonnet.

Luckily it has decent brakes and i did much the same... stamp on them as hard as possible and flick it into neutral!

jon-

16,534 posts

245 months

Monday 14th July 2014
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Wasn't this the ultimate cause of some of the class action lawsuits to do with "runaway cars" in America?

eybic

9,212 posts

203 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
jon- said:
Wasn't this the ultimate cause of some of the class action lawsuits to do with "runaway cars" in America?
Yes although I don't think it could be proved. I had it happen to me once, very scary situation indeed.

Leins

10,435 posts

177 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Scary stuff, and something I've always been a bit paranoid about

Can never understand why people keep things loose in their drivers footwell (e.g. open handbags), and reminds my of the sad story about 20 years ago of the mini-bus driver who was killed when a bottle managed to get trapped under his brake pedal

Dodsy

7,175 posts

256 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Terrifying when you are suddenly out of control isnt it. Happened to me twice in the TVR.

First time when I pulled out of a junction turning left big empty road so hoofed it intending to get the back to swing round. All good to start with, bank end swings out, I release throttle pressure to control it...but no its still going full chat !. Oh. Bugger. Back end carries on catching up with the front end, now doing a 360 smoking tyres with me hard on the brakes which only resulted in me starting to do donuts. Clutch in then Killed the ignition as it set off into the second 360 , ended up arse end into a hedge but no damage. Throttle cable had separated and got stuck inside the sheath.

Its very hard to work out what to do when you have an engine bouncing off the limiter going sideways and you dip the clutch but it carries on. Brain gets a bit confused (well mine did anyway).

Second time I came into a roundabout with a fair bit of speed on intending to shed it at the threshold to the roundabout then turn in, apex and away. Hit the brakes and .... nothing. Pedal moving but car not slowing down. Due my god like driving skills (not) I cleared the entry, clipped the apex and almost made it out of the exit. I was just about to pat myself on the back for a great recovery when I hit a big bump at the exit of the roundabout which made the back end snap round. Ended up parked facing the wrong way between two lamp posts. The driving gods were smiling on me that day.


amancalledrob

1,248 posts

163 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Had something similar on my motorbike when a vacuum hose got trapped in the throttle linkage. Found myself very grateful bikes have killswitches. Didn't enjoy lifting the tank and removing the intake stacks and airbox by the side of the road to fix it either!

Herbs

5,119 posts

258 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Glad everyone was ok and could have been a lot worse.

Had similar happen to me twice,

Had the throttle body stick wide open on my Elise S1 in heavy traffic which scared the st out of me.

The most embarrassing one was when I was 16 and me and my mate had scramblers with mine having been bored out to 90cc so was a bit lumpy on idle. We were riding around together one evening and pretended to re enact Road Rash (on the Megadrive) whilst driving along without realising there was a copper behind us. We got to the end of the road and stopped at the junction just as the blue lights came on.

I revved it (remember it runs lumpy on idle) to pull in round the corner and as I did so my clutch cable snapped....... resulting me hanging on for dear life as the bike shoots up, goes almost vertical in a spectacular wheelie resulting in the biggest bking ever from the copper who thought we were just dicks and wouldn't believe the cable snapped initially. Youth of yesterday eh smile

snoopy25

2,108 posts

149 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Had exactly the same issue when I bought my Saxo VTR new, pulled out on to a roundabout into 2nd gear and the car took off............scarey as st when the car pulls away under its own steam!

Fortunately like the OP it was the stupid car mat trapping the accelerator to the floor ggrrr....

Sonic

4,008 posts

236 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Herbs said:
We were riding around together one evening and pretended to re enact Road Rash...
hehe Which one of you had the chain?

jon-

16,534 posts

245 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Sonic said:
Herbs said:
We were riding around together one evening and pretended to re enact Road Rash...
hehe Which one of you had the chain?
Photos of Natasha or GTFO.

Phil Dicky

7,194 posts

292 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Happened to me once in the old Cerbera, changing from second to third, flat out so serious speed, worked out what was wrong and pulled the carpet away.......took 30 minutes for my heart rate to settle smile

Faust66

2,410 posts

194 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
I had something vaguely similar happen a while back.

I don’t have an accelerator cable on my car (1970 Volvo Amazon) let alone any of these new-fangled electronic throttle jobbies. The loud pedal is connected to the carb by a series of linkage rods (length of metal with a ball joint at either end). Unbeknown to me, one of the ball joints was worn and decided to jam... resulting in the engine red-lining in rush hour traffic. As the throttle was jammed wide open dipping the clutch stopped me shooting forward into the car in front but didn’t stop the engine revving scarily.

Fortunately I was only doing about 15 mph so I killed the ignition, pulled over and made a temporary repair at the side of the road and then carried on home.

Didn’t drive the car again until I had replaced all the linkages - I now check them regularly (and carry spares) in case it ever happens again. When I examined the faulty part I found a tiny piece of grit in the joint, which is what must have contributed to the failure.

silverback mike

11,293 posts

282 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
As above faust, the same happened to me in an old Mercedes, linkage jammed yikes straight over a mini roundabout, my face must have looked like something out of planet of the apes...

jonah35

3,940 posts

186 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
irocfan said:
well as it says above...

I was coming out of a small side road an audi tt went past and, with no other traffic on the road, I decided to boot it a little for some fun . So far so good, tail drifts ever so slightly out - this is fun, the car leaps forward catching to the audi so I let up off the throttle... and then it happens - I let off the throttle the car on the other hand has other ideas and it still on nearly full throttle and rapidly closing on the audi, stamp on the brakes still accelerating (though not as quickly) at this point the air isn't even blue as I'm too busy filling my pants! Foot now jammed on the brakes harder than I've ever pressed a peddle before I mange to knock the gearbox into neutral and then suddenly the revs die down to idle. Home is 1 mile away so I get home at a crawl (ready to knock into neutral asap) with no problems.

Cause of this potentially serious mishap? The over-mat had slipped off the tethering hook and the throttle peddle had wedged itself underneath

Moral of the story - CHECK THAT YOUR OVER-MATS ARE SECURE!!!!
Or, don't mash the throttle to the floor whilst drifting out of a side road

CrutyRammers

13,735 posts

227 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
One of the (many!) faults with my old peugeot 405 was a sticking throttle. Fortunately it was sticking kind of half way, rather than fully open, so it didn't lead to any major loss of control and I was able to limp home carefully.

Mr GrimNasty

8,172 posts

199 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
Many moons ago my Astra GTE16V had an annoying 'main dealer untraceable' fault with the ICV which resulted in either unwanted acceleration or revving at the traffic lights making me look like a tool wanting a race, or stalling on gear changes. The first time it happened with the sudden loss of power steering and I nearly took out a lamppost trying to haul it around.

V8 FOU

3,023 posts

176 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
This happened to a customers Saab many years ago.
Unfortunately they were stupid and tried to stop the car on the brakes, occasionally dipping the clutch. I recovered the car and it was, well, a bit dead. Told them to throw it away, but they wanted it repaired. Soooo, new clutch, head overhaul to replace bent valves and new pads and discs. Much money.
2 weeks later get a call to say it's "making a funny noise". Went out to it and started it and it was making a clunking and chirruping noise. Oh dear, broken crank if ever I heard one.
Car was written off.

Debaser

8,429 posts

290 months

Monday 14th July 2014
quotequote all
jonah35 said:
irocfan said:
well as it says above...

I was coming out of a small side road an audi tt went past and, with no other traffic on the road, I decided to boot it a little for some fun . So far so good, tail drifts ever so slightly out - this is fun, the car leaps forward catching to the audi so I let up off the throttle... and then it happens - I let off the throttle the car on the other hand has other ideas and it still on nearly full throttle and rapidly closing on the audi, stamp on the brakes still accelerating (though not as quickly) at this point the air isn't even blue as I'm too busy filling my pants! Foot now jammed on the brakes harder than I've ever pressed a peddle before I mange to knock the gearbox into neutral and then suddenly the revs die down to idle. Home is 1 mile away so I get home at a crawl (ready to knock into neutral asap) with no problems.

Cause of this potentially serious mishap? The over-mat had slipped off the tethering hook and the throttle peddle had wedged itself underneath

Moral of the story - CHECK THAT YOUR OVER-MATS ARE SECURE!!!!
Or, don't mash the throttle to the floor whilst drifting out of a side road
But that's boring!