<VV> Steering Shaft - the human spear.

[James Davis]

Counter point.  On my first wedding adversary in 1965, we were 
returning to Albuquerque from a house hunting trip.  On a four lane 
West Texas Highway at 70 mph, I noticed a 1964 full size Chevy make a 
left turn into the median and stop.  When I was about 150 feet from 
the car Mrs Doyle decided to continue across the road, slowly.  We 
met at the intersection after 68 ft of skid marks..  I got the 62 
Monza convertible down to about 45 mph when we hit her in the right 
front wheel with the left front of the Monza.  The impact was severe 
enough that it spun the Monza around and the left rear impacted the 
Chevy's right rear wheel.  This impact shoved the battery into the 
engine breaking the left intake off the cylinder head.  Yes, battery 
acid everywhere.  The front was crushed enough that the bumper 
punctured the left tire aft of the wheel.  The gas tank was driven 
down to the highway but did not rupture.  The steering wheel and 
shaft moved into the passenger compartment six inches.   I had a 
death grip on the wheel pressing the brake petal with all my 
might.   The force of the collision collapsed the steering wheel and 
I forced it out to left window parallel to the glass. My pregnant 
wife's seat belt was loose and stretched enough to let her head 
impact the windshield shattering it.  We survived only with cuts and 
bruises, even our Siamese car who was sleeping in the convertible top 
well at the time of the crash survived.  We bought the 65 Corsa 
convertible the next week to replace the Monza.  Oh yes, a heathy 
baby boy, Rad, was born six months later
Jim Davis



At 11:44 AM 12/6/2005, VAN A. PERSHING wrote:


>In one of the recent posts re: '65/'66 Differences, someone menyioned the fact
>the the '65 steering shaft serves as a spear to the driver in front end
>collisions. I got a chance to test that theory when I crashed my '65 Corsa
>summer before last. A guy pulling a hugh trailer turned left in front of
>me and I nailed one of the trailer axles at about 35 or 40 mph. The point of
>impact was directly in front of the steering box. It shoved that area of
>the car back a good two feet. (You can see a picture of it at
>www.geocities.com/vapershing/corvair.html) The nice crushable trunk area
>really saved my bacon. I ended up with a sore neck, a rash across my chest
>from the seat belt and - I bit my lip!
>
>The steering wheel only moved toward me about a half an inch. Upon examination
>I observed that the shaft bent downward. My conclusion is that in order for
>the shaft to come back and spear the driver, you'd would have to be doing a
>wheelie during the crash!! But, that's an experiment for another time....