Stuck throttle and the results on way to show

My buddy Gary and others were on their way to the Rumblers in Cleveland.Garys throttle stuck wide open all of a sudden forcing his nailhead to put him in a 60MPH and then over burnout.He reached down to turn it off and noticed the key had fallen out and was on the floor.Within secounds the rear came around and he went accross both lanes and smacked the concrete,spun around and went back two lanes and off into the grass.He was able to put it in neutral.He jumped out and pulled the sparkplugs wires out to kill the engine.He had a nice cover over the coil.

Lucky he didnt flip.Kissed the steering wheel and dash.Fat lip,bloody nose,brushed chest and shins.Car wasnt so lucky.Lesson here: Use heims or some other setup that has no way of binding no matter which way it pivots!!!! Heres some pics

 

And a couple more pics.The engine broke free and is about 3" forward now

 

That just sucks....Glad he'll be ok,and the car can always be repaired.
A few Q's though...... Ever figure out what "stuck"? One return spring or two? What was means of throttle linkage? Cable/Rod? Any info if a mount broke causing engine movement?
Just things everyone should concider and look over first,and make sure all's ok before venturing out.......

 

x2



also, yes it can be difficult to think quick enough when stuff happens. I have a guys 1907 car here and it has a simple kill switch to push in, on the dash. I was looking at it a few days ago, thinking that it's a good idea

 

The linkage pivot points were not a free floating contact like a heim.Just two ends (rods) drilled with a full thread machine screw.Never use a pivot contact point with the threads touching it.I think there wasnt enough angle in the linkage also.My friend didnt build the car and learned a tough lesson as we sometimes all do.The bolts on the mounts broke and they were grade 8.Lots of force and weight going forward.Just like my car and its heavy shifter knob making it jump into gear and then into a fench,sometimes things catch up to you before you catch it first!!Iam just happy he lived to tell me about it and make us all think about stuff.

 

Very Lucky

 

Could have been worse! Glad that he is ok!
Jay

 

Glad no one was hurt but what kind of ignition switch was he using that the key falls out of ?

 

Key fell out? Wow....I put simple kill switches in all my cars....somewhere easy to access....and I always check all my linkages and gottcha areas of my cars prior to rollin out!

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Key fell out.... Not uncommon, with "universal" cheap-o items.

4TTRUK

 

2Xs on the simple ingnition kill switch,, have them on 3 of the 4 rides, will be installing the 4th this winter

 

The key had never done that before This car is driven more than anyones I know,hes been all over.What Iam saying is check your stuff.You never know .Even good stuff breaks.Sometimes ones misfortunes helps others do things different.Not trying to make my buddy look foolish.He will have lots of hands on the car over the winter and things will be looked over well.Will make a good thing from bad

 

My dad has this happen on an O/T '75 F250 with a 4bbl 390. He hit 80mph before he knew what happened. Thankfully the key stayed in the ignition that time! (It would fall out on occasion,as described. But this was a wore out 30+ year old truck that could be started with a screw driver!) I'm glad he's OK tho! Too bad about the car. Best of luck on the rebuild!

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While a kill switch could be a good idea, how many of us would even think about it in an instant? Very, very few. My throttle cable got stuck once and everyone asked, "Why didn't you turn the car off?" or "You should have put it into reverse." In that instant, the ONLY quick response, if there's one at all, is to mash the brakes. Our instinct tells us to make it stop. That's why we hit the brakes first. There's no thinking of different options. When shit goes wrong, it does it quicker than good thinking.

 

Thanks for kill switch idea & so glad your friend survived the accident. Could have been really bad for everyone.


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Ive had that happen a time or two -but i was lucky & had no damage . hate to see your bent, but at least you stayed upright.

 

depends...maybe... but still a good idea in mho.....very common on alot of rides such as dirt bikes ,snowmobiles,personel watercraft, ( no brakes on those 2 ) and 2 on the old race car, one on the wheel one on the dash

 

Good point Fred. Glad this turned out better than it could have. Steel can be fixed.

 

I've felt the terror - stuck throttle caused the wildest ride I've ever taken, from a driveway across a busy road, and I was a passenger, totally helpless. 450hp in a 2200# car covers lots of ground in a flash. After that experience I began maintaining my own throttle cables and springs religiously, and I never mash the accelerator on any car without first pointing it in a direction with several hundred feet of clear road.

Reminds me of something I read years ago in a magazine test of a new 427 Corvette: "When you put your foot down on the accelerator you better know where you're going, because you are going to arrive there very quickly."

 

Good lesson here, and very glad your friend is OK.
Could have been a disaster.
Thanks for posting...

 

Training and thinking for overpowered hotrod.
Thought process and build practices for overpowered hot rod.
Quality parts for overpowered hot rod.

One thing is for certain,
something will go wrong eventually at some time. What or when will be apparent only at that time so you really need to be ready for anything all the time. You really shouldn't have the same complacent mentality when driving a hot rod as when you do a late model daily driver and amongst the late models on the road.

Every drag car has a clearly marked kill switch, almost everyone with their feet on the track know what it's for and how to use it. Because shit goes wrong and happens fast they go for it first.


History has a habit of repeating itself, all these "lessons" are ancient history and nobody is required to learn them the hard way, in harms way, or over a dead mans chest.

 

So if the car has an alternator, what is the easiest (and safest) way to install a kill switch to instantly stop an over reving motor?

 

Break the power wire to the coil with a switch.
But proper return springs including the geometry and proper throttle linkage components including the geometry should prevent most of that from ever happening on a correctly operating carb. The line of pull aka geometry is really important.

 

My drag car has a kill switch. I know for sure I am putting a kill switch in my A, when building it. Glad he is ok. Very lucky! Someone was watching out for him!

 

kill switch + a fuel shutoff that you hit with the chute lever, practice blindfolded. (Maybe a bit of overkill with a street car.) With 2,000+ hp you can arrive at the wrong destination pretty quickly .

 

While this is obviously an important issue, I have to say, in all the pictures of car interiors I've seen, I've NEVER seen a kill switch. I've never seen one in a car period, except a racer. Now, suddenly, everyone has one or is installing one. I guess they could have been hidden, but why would you hide it?

It seems like the thing to do, would be to make sure your throttle operates properly.

 

glad everybody ok Years ago i had my 440 with tri power stick wide open i just kept power shifting till 4th and then shut it down wicked scary and totally lucky I was on a straight back road

 

If you have a clutch, instinct makes you automatically push it in when you hit the brakes...this is why you should have a manual shift car....it gives you time to think about killing the engine with a kill switch afterwards.

 

Glad you're OK.

On my T bucket, I put a Ford impact cutoff switch in the ignition circuit to the MSD box. It may not have prevented this accident, but when the car hit the first wall, it would have killed the engine. May even have shut it off when it crossed the median. My ex wife jumped a curb in her Ford compact and the switch killed the engine. I was the only one she knew to call to get it running again.

The electric fuel pumps in both my cars are on oil pressure switches,too.

 

Glad he's OK, that's pretty lucky there.
My cheapo universal ignition switch from Oreilly's wont allow the key to come out when in the run position. That's just as important part as having a kill switch. I also try to not use cable operated throttles at all. With a full mechanical you might be able to pull it back with the pedal. Zero chance of that with a cable.