I fully support your Personal right to make any decisions about your own Personal safety. But I really wonder if you are willing to accept all the other consequences of the decision.

Do you have a moral obligation to comply with Federal Law?

Do you have the right to Decide about the safety of any and all other occupants of you vehicle?

Are you going to notify your insurance company of your actions and freely accept the higher premium?

Is the cement and rebar necessary to insure your safety? Or is your intent to kill everybody in the Toyota Camery in front of you that stopped behind a semi truck too quick for you to effectivly stop in time to avoid the "accident"?

This is not an all inclusive list

And for the record I am the most ANTI "safety ****" ever born!

I think free adults should be left to their own decisions, and the State or Federal Government has NO role other that that necessary to provide safety to the population in general.

On the other hand, I believe that YOUR fellow citizens are responsible to voice their opinions about practices or behaviors that potentially impact all of US.

Your decision is a part of why the Government is frequently legislating our behavior.

Unless YOU are totally self insured, WE all bear some of the costs of your decision and those of others like you.

 

Dude, it is obvious the Super Duty is a weak platform for all of your ramming needs. I'd look into a Peterbilt, Mack or Freightliner cab/chasis, throw a cattle guard on it and call it good. Either of those choices will take care of those pesky econocars, family sedans, or tin foil full size pickups that may get in your way. Since it seems you are going for maximum kill power, why sell yourself short?

C'mon, are you serious? Rebar and concrete in the frame rails?

 

Does anyone make a depleted uranium bull bar yet?

 

I had considered building a retired 5-ton, three axle all wheel drive military surplus truck, installing an 8.3 cummins and an Allison World transmission and so on. My wife and I had some discussion about this project and ended up ordering the new
Super Duty. Building the old truck would have eliminated a number of issues I had with the new truck, which will be here in
about four weeks.

 

Pedneauvii

I must rescind one miss statement:

"There may be a "black box" associated with the airbag system on some vehicles but I doubt that they are common on ALL vehicles within a major manufacture. Usually the motivation is to PREVENT product liability litigation"

Sitting in my truck at lunch listening to Rush, I re-read my owners manual and it does state that the SRS system has a "black box" function.

Some ideas.... One, the front seat belts are electronically tied to the SRS and if disabled they will no longer work properly.

Two, Another poster is having an ABS light problem that seems to be tracked to a bad ABS module to the tune of $1100 or more. The bad module is also affecting his PCM and Speedo... I think that disabling the SRS is going to be more trouble than you want.

 

You can see the seat belt pre-tensioners on the front seat belts (under the seats and towards the center). They are tied into the system and fire (solid rocket fuel) just before impact to tighten the seat belt.

Matt

 

The seat belts are part of the input data going into the electronic control unit. The only thing it tells the control unit is, is the seat belt buckeled or not. The seat belt retractor is still just a mechanical device that will operate even if there is an electronics
problem. Some of the higher end vehicles, this statement would
not be true. Some of them have a system in the seat belt retractors that will tighten the belt during a collision. There are other factors in the design of a vehicle that should be a concern.
the Crown Vic is a good example. I just read about the chevy
Avalanche having a gas tank rupture problem during an off set front end crash involving the seperation of a cross member during the crash and then being shoved into the gas tank. In this day and age, there is simply no excuse for this. Ford had problems with fuel being transfered from one tank to the next in its older
(1988-1993?) trucks. Their fix was to install a one way valve on the fuel sender. Many trucks and RV's burned because of this. When a new vehicle comes out, a person may wonder, what corners were cut to get this vehicle out.

 

Wrong. There are pre-tensioners in the system that work independently of the retractors.

 

Pedneauvii

nafzimo Is correct according to my 2001 F-250 owners manual there is a relationship to the seatbelts and the ABS module that does not work properly if there is an ABS fault. And a big caution to get the system fixed if a fault is detected, as the seat belts can harm you if the system is not working properly.

 

When I first saw this thread, I really didn't think much of it. Now today, I read an article in the paper about these black boxes in the local paper and thought I'd post some of the info. I have found while looking into the subject.

Here are some of the better reading assignments:

1. The main mfgr. of these devices is Vetronix. See: http://www.vetronix.com/diagnostics/cdr/

They are placed in a sh&tload of GM vehicles, and only in a couple Ford products (well, so far anyway). Here is the list:

http://vetronix.com/diagnostics/cdr/vehicle_list.html

2. Sample CDR report from Vetronix system:

http://www.crashanalysis.net/CDR%20Sample%20Report.pdf

3. This technology and the insurance industry:

http://www.injurysciences.com/Documents/Claims82002.pdf

http://www.claimsmag.com/Issues/Aug0...logy_tools.asp

4. A recent LA Times article:
http://www.latimes.com/classified/au...eds-autos-news

 

The quick links you provided had a lot of good information. I was glad to see the "black box" that GM has been using so much has not yet made it to the Ford trucks. I'm sure that will change. As for removing the system, I may let it stay. My main concern about
the air bags was the impact they would have on my very small framed wife. I do know they powered them down in recent years,
but was it enough? Originally they were powered up to "catch" an ubelted driver. Seat belt laws changed the amout of power needed in them.