• From: Columbia, MD
  • Registered: 2010-10-21
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Topic: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Cross posted from some FB pages:

Guys and gals, Fritz from Dahlinboysracing here. Yes, the car that took out the guardrail at Thompson yesterday.

First, I want to say the driver, Harry Collins is A-OK as reported.I traded voicemails with him this morning, he was on his way to work. He did an unbelievable job in a horrible situation, and thankfully we were the only casualty. Sorry about everyone loseing an hour of racing.

We have in car video, and it is pretty terrifying. Harry was right at 100 mph when he went off, and was pumping away on the brake pedal. As soon as I can I will have it posted up.

Some thank yous:

Roll cage Components who built and installed the cage. I will get some photos in the next few days and post them. It did not move. The A pillars are flattened against and past it.

Jay and the Lemons staff for having great rules AND enforcing them. We all bitch and complain, but when you see the video hopefully you will agree, they are trying to keep us from hurting ourselves. Why anyone would race without a head and neck restraint...

Everyone who came up and checked on our driver and commented on his skill and how much worse it could have been.

Harry: Great teammate, I would recommend him to anyone looking for a driver. He was great behind the wheel, helped out whenever he was asked and he and his wife Dee cook and feed you as well! He did say after things calmed down "tell me what I owe you" . In no way do I think this was his fault and I think that was and is a great gesture on his part. I don't see how I can ask him to pay.

Sorry we did not stay for the awards, it was a choice of getting home at 1:00 am or after 3 am, I chose 1:00. My nerves were shot and I was exhausted. Still pretty wiped out after unloading this morning.

So what happened? Give me a day or two and I will post up details on the brake system. When the car was brought back to our paddock, it had a good pedal. We jacked it up, removed the wheels and each caliper was working. There were no brake fluid leaks anywhere. When we unloaded this morning the brakes worked fine. We are baffled.

Thanks again for the concern and well wishes, glad the only loss was our car.

Fritz

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2 Reply by Fishah (edited by Fishah 2018-08-13 11:32 AM)

  • From: Chandler, AZ
  • Registered: 2011-04-18
  • Posts: 839

Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Glad to hear the driver was ok! Scary stuff.

Master Cylinder is still full? Sounds like the brake fluid may have just boiled. Do you have ducting? How old was the fluid? Any sticky calipers that may have caused overheating?

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3 Reply by chaase (edited by chaase 2018-08-13 11:28 AM)

  • chaase
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Glad to hear he is okay. The race gods were smiling on him, all hail the race gods. I was expecting a lot worse when our driver radio'd in about the incident. He was one of the cars that you rocketed past and we were worried.

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4 Reply by chaase (edited by chaase 2018-08-13 11:33 AM)

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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Fishah wrote:

Glad to hear the driver was ok! Scary stuff.

Master Cylinder is still full? Sounds like the brake fluid may have just boiled. Do you have ducting?

I am curious to know what happened. Track was only green for 40minutes or so. It is enough time to boil the fluid but the car went all day Saturday so it is surprising that they would have that problem on Sunday. I've lost the pedal before and it is scary!

1992 Saturn SL2 (retired) - Elmo's Revenge -  Class B winner, Heroic Fix winner x2
1969 Rover P6B 3500S(sold) - Super G-Rover - I.O.E Winner, Class C Winner
1996 Saturn SW2 - Elmo's Revenge (reborn!), Saturn SL1  Dazzleshipm Class C x2 and IOE winner
1974 AMC Javelin - Oscar's Trash heap - IOE,”Organizer's Choice" and "I got Screwed" award winner
  • From: NH
  • Registered: 2010-01-20
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

My brother said he saw the car cross the track after turn 1 from his rear view, and saw it get air off the curb. Don't know if that's exaggeration or not, but it was enough to wake him up to "oh crap that is ending badly". I'm really glad your driver is ok, and the fact he was able to not take anyone else with him is amazing. Lost time racing doesn't matter at all as long as the driver is ok and all safety gear did it's job.


I'll throw my arm chair $0.02 at boiled brakes if you can't find a problem now. We've had old fluid boil in half an hour, and it just happens without warning. I went from normal feeling brakes at one brake point to almost nothing at the next.

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6 Reply by chaase (edited by chaase 2018-08-13 12:01 PM)

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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

TheEngineer wrote:

Lost time racing doesn't matter at all as long as the driver is ok and all safety gear did it's job.

In my opinion, if anyone cars about the lost racing time, they probably don't belong in a Lemons race!

1992 Saturn SL2 (retired) - Elmo's Revenge -  Class B winner, Heroic Fix winner x2
1969 Rover P6B 3500S(sold) - Super G-Rover - I.O.E Winner, Class C Winner
1996 Saturn SW2 - Elmo's Revenge (reborn!), Saturn SL1  Dazzleshipm Class C x2 and IOE winner
1974 AMC Javelin - Oscar's Trash heap - IOE,”Organizer's Choice" and "I got Screwed" award winner
  • From: St Louis
  • Registered: 2011-10-20
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

TheEngineer wrote:

My brother said he saw the car cross the track after turn 1 from his rear view, and saw it get air off the curb. Don't know if that's exaggeration or not, but it was enough to wake him up to "oh crap that is ending badly". I'm really glad your driver is ok, and the fact he was able to not take anyone else with him is amazing. Lost time racing doesn't matter at all as long as the driver is ok and all safety gear did it's job.


I'll throw my arm chair $0.02 at boiled brakes if you can't find a problem now. We've had old fluid boil in half an hour, and it just happens without warning. I went from normal feeling brakes at one brake point to almost nothing at the next.

Adding to the boiled fluid possibility, was the track dry and fast on Sunday? From what I saw on Saturday it was pretty wet so not a lot of hard late braking happening.

I had boiled fluid at RA, happened immediately after a pit stop due to the loss of airflow, turn five is a massive pucker with a pedal to the floor. Fortunately I tested them early and was able to get a couple of downshifts in before throwing the car sideways into the grass and gravel. The brakes came back quite quickly after that but we bleed out the fluid in the calipers to be on the dafe side.

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  • chaase
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Brett85p wrote:

Adding to the boiled fluid possibility, was the track dry and fast on Sunday? From what I saw on Saturday it was pretty wet so not a lot of hard late braking happening.

It seemed like that was about the only time the track was dry all weekend.

1992 Saturn SL2 (retired) - Elmo's Revenge -  Class B winner, Heroic Fix winner x2
1969 Rover P6B 3500S(sold) - Super G-Rover - I.O.E Winner, Class C Winner
1996 Saturn SW2 - Elmo's Revenge (reborn!), Saturn SL1  Dazzleshipm Class C x2 and IOE winner
1974 AMC Javelin - Oscar's Trash heap - IOE,”Organizer's Choice" and "I got Screwed" award winner
  • From: Londonderry nh
  • Registered: 2017-10-24
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Glad he is alright that’s all that matters

  • From: Westfield Ma
  • Registered: 2012-10-29
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Very glad to hear your driver is still among us and is fine imagine he is a bit sore.  Did not race Sunday in the monsoon but raced Saturday and had a great time.  Cars are no longer jalopy's as far as reliabilyu goes these days except for handful of new teams which made for fun on the track.

The new teams only will get better.

  • From: Seacoast NH
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Glad your drivers ok.  That was a puckering moment.

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12 Reply by VKZ24 (edited by VKZ24 2018-08-14 12:37 PM)

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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

First, we all VERY GLAD your driver is OK.  Damn that was scary! 

Second, I'm sure we'd all love to know what caused the brake failure.  We assuming boiled fluid, but was that the case?  When was the last fluid change?  FWIW, we change ours every single race, which isn't to say that it can't happen to freshly changed fluid.

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  • n0m4d
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

We were so glad to hear your driver was ok.  I was in the garages and most of the time you could hear a pin drop while we were waiting for news on the driver.  It's a weird spot to have the fluid boil since the last time you are braking hard there is in turn 4 (which I've seen plenty of cars go off due to cooked brakes).  By the time you are back at turn 1 you have had plenty of time to cool the brakes, at least so they are not gone to that degree.  Please keep us updated!  We are super diligent with our brakes so I'd like to know if there is anything we need to be on top of.

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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

Thompson is always crowded. I know I used my brakes heavily around the hill a number of times to deal with pockets. And the way brakes boil means that even light braking can help tip you over that edge. Unlike fade, which is when the pads are getting too hot, boiling happens suddenly, and usually right after you let off the brakes. Pressurizing a fluid raises it's boiling point, so when you're on the brakes with some force, you can tip the fluid above the point where it will boil at no added pressure, but the pedal still feels ok. Then you release the pedal and the fluid now boils instantly because it's at that temp. You don't notice it until the next time you press and find there is nothing there because there are bubbles in the lines. Exactly what happened to me at NJ the first time there with the Saab. Medium brakes at 5, 6, and 7, which all felt fine, then went to slow a little for 9 and my foot went to the floor. Big pucker factor but I managed to scrub speed enough to get around.

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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

TheEngineer wrote:

Thompson is always crowded. I know I used my brakes heavily around the hill a number of times to deal with pockets. And the way brakes boil means that even light braking can help tip you over that edge. Unlike fade, which is when the pads are getting too hot, boiling happens suddenly, and usually right after you let off the brakes. Pressurizing a fluid raises it's boiling point, so when you're on the brakes with some force, you can tip the fluid above the point where it will boil at no added pressure, but the pedal still feels ok. Then you release the pedal and the fluid now boils instantly because it's at that temp. You don't notice it until the next time you press and find there is nothing there because there are bubbles in the lines. Exactly what happened to me at NJ the first time there with the Saab. Medium brakes at 5, 6, and 7, which all felt fine, then went to slow a little for 9 and my foot went to the floor. Big pucker factor but I managed to scrub speed enough to get around.

Thanks for the info and I definitely was equating brake fade (which I have experienced on track) with boiling fluid (which I have not).  Boiling brake fluid sounds scary as hell.

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  • Registered: 2018-08-15
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

We run a dual master cylinder system, front, and rear. That way we always have at least one working (hopefully).
Glad to hear that everyone involved is okay. That was a scary sight to see.
-TR8 #206

  • Registered: 2017-08-05
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Re: Dahlinboysracing: we fought the wall and the wall won

dahlinboysracing wrote:

So what happened? Give me a day or two and I will post up details on the brake system. When the car was brought back to our paddock, it had a good pedal. We jacked it up, removed the wheels and each caliper was working. There were no brake fluid leaks anywhere. When we unloaded this morning the brakes worked fine. We are baffled.

Fritz, Harry and team --

Heard about this through the grapevine.  So sorry to hear of your experience.

Two thoughts:
1)  My guess:  check the axles and axle hub nuts.  If a nut loosened or fell off, or CV joint loosened or began pulling apart, the axle will bang the brake rotor sideways, slamming it against the pads until the pads are hammered back into the calipers ("brake pad slap"), sometimes all the way, just like when you install a fresh set of pads.  This forces fluid all the way back up into the master cylinder.  Then, when the driver steps on the brake pedal, the first few pumps begin re-filling the brake calipers with fluid and move the pads towards the rotor, but the pads are still touching only air -- the pads aren't yet making contact with the rotor(s).    It feels just like there are zero brakes, because there aren't any.  Only one axle side needs to be damaged for this to occur.  It is immediate and no related to brakes overheating, which is  why none of your other drivers experienced it.  Harry may have detected a shake in the car just prior to this occurring -- usually a few turns before -- but even though it can be felt in the steering, the steering will remain tight and precise for obvious reasons.

2)  if not, then even though the brakes are "working", are they really retracting properly?  I'd wonder if perhaps they were dragging and the continuous heat build up then boiled the brakes.  If the calipers or pads are corroded and don't freely travel (or jam part way), then this could occur.

Hope it helps and so sorry again for the traumatic experience.

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