“I was only conscious for the first three rolls,” Andrew Nelson recalls. “I felt the car go over the first time, which was a relatively soft roll. Then, when it grabbed the track, it started to violently roll. On the third flip, I was knocked out.”
As the car tumbled, Andrew faced more peril: The fuel cell leaked and started …
This was a really well written article with great tie-in with industry & regulatory folks for constructive input. Andrew's openness on how things went, areas where improvements could have been made, and general positive attitude is commendable. Thank-you for putting this together and I hope that Andrew continues to heal well.
Remember following the wreck thread when it first happened. Glad Andrew is healing up and great follow up!
An excellent article, and addressed some questions I did not even know that I had yet.
Thank you for this, glad to hear of Andrew's recovery. When investigating Andrew and Calvin's latest efforts it seems the LS is now the preferred bullet whereas the Atlas is a distant memory. Yes the failure was catastrophic, so dump the idea totally?
In reply to 759NRNG :
They have not given up on the Atlas engines, iirc they just feel they've figured out all they can get from a JY stock bottom end, and want to try other low-cost JY engine options. Calvin has a video on this. Again, iirc they are building LT generation SBCs
In reply to 759NRNG :
Atlas projects are developing. Calvin is doing his best to finish his LT (Gen 5) project. I am running at 10%, so the video production is way down. But, No, we have not walked away from the Atlas platform.
So very good to hear from you Andrew, happy Father's day!!!!....is it better that I go to NIVLAC57 Ytube to keep up?
Great to see you're posting here, Andrew! I hope recovery continues well for you.
First I'm very glad to hear Andrew is recovering. I know rotator cuff surgery is not fun a fun recovery.
Second, I'd like to add my thanks to GRM for a very well written article, a lot of food for thought here.
Third, I'd like to take a moment to let a non-safety item from the article sink in: "a Vortec 4200 straight-six that puts 577 horsepower to the rear wheels. . . the car ran a 9.12 at 149.27 mph,”
What!?! I am always in awe of the incredible efficiency with which the Nelson family cars turn horsepower into acceleration.
In reply to Bigben :
That's a good launch for you! Heavy street tired cars are often a full second slower, on slicks they dip down into the high 9s, with that kind of trap speed.
759NRNG said:So very good to hear from you Andrew, happy Father's day!!!!....is it better that I go to NIVLAC57 Ytube to keep up?
Yes. Video production is slow while I heal. But we don't update the web site or the FB page anymore.
Floating Doc (Forum Supporter) said:Great to see you're posting here, Andrew! I hope recovery continues well for you.
Thank you. 4 months in and I have a long way to go. But I see the progress on a weekly basis.
In reply to Bigben :
We were far below the 577 HP level on the pass as we were slowly creeping up on things. The goals was to bump it up at Gainesvle and turn everything up to 11 at Orlando. In 44 years of racing this was my only crash. We will implement many changes before we chase our 200+ goals.
Pete. (l33t FS) said:In reply to Bigben :
That's a good launch for you! Heavy street tired cars are often a full second slower, on slicks they dip down into the high 9s, with that kind of trap speed.
That was an intentional soft 9 second launch (low boost and low rpm) with an 8 second mph (only 12-13 psi boost). Definitely not a good launch for us, but we were being conservative. The car had huge potential - total loss. We will rebuild.
Sorry for all the late replies....we were at Maple Grove yesterday. Mama Bear (Paula) went 6 rounds to win her class in her truck....yup...I'm braggin' on my wife...
But seriously...we all know that the best way to get back to normal is to do what is normal and for us that is racing.
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