someone trashed my car
 

last friday some **** comming from the opposing direction decited it was a good idea to make a left turn right in front of me and throw her volvo s80 break righ in front of me.

i slammed the breaks but at 60 - 70 km/h a car needs more distance to stop...fortunately my speed was way lower than that when i hit the car, but the damage is rather grave. damaged bumper, broken headlighy, the edge of the hood is bend, and the front fender is all bend... but it gets wors as there's some structural damage underneath. the girl that was driving was still had a preliminary licence but her dad was with her so he put his name down on the insurance form ..it would be a lot of trouble for her to get a licence otherwise and although i'm not sure it that's a good idea given her driving skills i didn't want to argue as they where clearly addmitting being the cause of the accident, and we all make mistakes, but it still sucks.

stupid thing is that repairs are going to be extensive and that the insurance is most likely to call it a totall loss... mondaymorning an insurance expert will look at the damage and sice my dad know the guy i'm sure he'll make a good deal but i'm not sure if that will save the car.

it would be a real shame if i'd have to let this one go because this car has a very low milage for a 20 year old car (or even newer second hand cars).. appart from some worn rubber sealings here and there that might need to be replaced at some point this car is as good as it was 20 years ago.

it requires premium gas but it's light has a Cd somewhere between 0.30 and 0.32, a frontal area of 1.9 m? . it felt like a sportscar but with the rearseat folded the there's there's enough room to fit a whole bycicle in there. it even came with tinted windows and a deep glossy metalic blue finish that hides the wear of 20 years quite well and made some people wonder if it was repainted recently...it has a straightforward edgy characterfull design that was made with aerodynamics in mind after the last oil crisis.
finally i obtained the car for next to nothing.

the insurance expert will look at it this monday so we'll see. my dad thinks it can be fixed but i'm not sure if it's worth it...i'll have to put my sentimental attachment asside and look at the alternatives

i know in the end it's just naterial damage, and things could easily be far worse...the fact this turned out to be a little accident without anyone getting hurt is priceless of course and i try to keep that in mind but on the other hand, i've had enough stress as it is for the moment...

anyway sorry for the rant.... it's just been a frustrating weekend.

the good news is that all the gas from the recently filled tank has been "saved" and my dad can use it in his car.


i hope everyone keeps it safe!

glad you're okay! might be a good idea to check w/ a chiropractor to see if your spine is okay. sometimes problems show up many months or years later. happened to me! trust chiro care more than the med care i do.

Good to hear that you are ok, I second on getting checked out. Never hurts to do so and could save you from a lot of pain down the road.

As for the kadett, not sure how its built, but is it a unitized unibody or body on frame? If unitized, you might be able to get the front sub frame from a yard and replace yours. That would pretty much give you a brand newish front half to your car.

lunarhighway -

I'm really sorry to hear that, especially because I admire the amount of time and effort you have put into "professionalizing" your mods.

You should definitely keep track of how you feel for the rest of the week. Like bowtieguy said, it might now show up right away.

CarloSW2

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

the opel kadet? that was my chevettes forign twin! :( looks almost exactly like it too....

well i'm off to the garage where the insurance expert will have a look at what it's still worth...although i don't think it'll be much and it doesn't matter much either... i need something that can get me to work whatever it costs... if it is repaired it will have to be done pretty well is it's mandatory for any car that has had structural damage to have it's alignment checked.... from a pure technical perspective it should be possible to get it on the road again, but we'll see

as for my own alignment...maybe is should do that... id don't have any complaints to speak of and a barely felt the impact... don't think the speed was to high, but i know sometimes these things show up later so i might go.

i know next week the garage gets a "new" kadett... it could be mine for 500€ they said, ... doesn't have to much km but it's an old diesel wich is both a heavier engine als has about 45 HP as opposed to my 75 :( im no horspower junky but i appreciate a car both being swift and economic... so i'm not to enthousiastic, but i'll have to see... if i do replace it i'd hope to get something less polluting.

i hope i can save kadettski, but ok... it's a thing... and when things are broken sometimes they need to be replaced...

I know NOTHING about deisels, but depending on the model year of this older model, would it be possible to recycle the engine from your current crashed kadett and use it in the "new" kadett. You'd have more hp and an engine that you are laready familira with. Of course, this means that the insurance payout you get would be smaller because you are keeping the car, but it might be worth it.
I guess you have to look at the numbers and make a decision

in theory things might fit although the gearbox would have to be changed too, but regulations are pretty strict here, you can't just swap engines around unless they're the same... we have anual car inspections and they're pretty strict about these things... different tire size or lowering the car in a certain way can get you into trouble... also the work involved whould be quite extensive.

the good news is that i think things will most likely get repaired... the insurace guy even asked my dad if the km's on readout where real or wether it had gone round (wich it's due to do, soon i'll have 0km's again... :p) cause they're so low for a car this age... and they gave me a good sum....enough to cover the repairs if i do it myself.
my dad works in a garage so he has all the facilities to do all the straightening. and i won't have to pay the working hours wich the insurance does take into account... replacement parts should be fairly easy and cheap to locate so if the frame wants to straighten out again things will be ok. according to my dad he's repaired worse accidents so that's reassuring.

i think next weekend i'm off to the junkyard finding a new bumper and fender (the hood might be straightened, but i think i'll look at what these cost too)...

i hope no complications turn up... otherwise i'll part this one out to the last knob and swap all my mods into the other kadett if that's any decent.

we'll see...

Great it's going to get fixed. It was a sad day when I got sideswiped in my '82 Kadett. It was a great car.

FYI for those in the US not in the know - lunarhighway's car is the cousin of the late 80's Pontiac Lemans - a distant cousin of the T1000 but that was in the earlier years ;)

btw the family's comming over for another visit to the us.

my car is a kadett E ,called vauxhall astra in the UK. since opel decided at some point to have all car names end with an A "astra" was addopted as the successor of the kadett thus becomming the astra F wich was succeeded by the G and now the H model wich is comming to the US now as the saturn astra.

of course appart from maybe a vague resemblence for those willing to look for it it's a totally different car...but it's nice to see the family line lives on...

to bad things like the big rear hatch got lost in favor of bigger taillights etc... style is a bigger seller than function these days...