Glenn Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 CCR Rule: 15.6.4 Padding All roll cage surfaces that may come in contact with the driver should be padded with high-density padding such as Ethafoam or Ensolite. It is recommended that padding meeting SFI specification 45.1 be used. I'm being told the stuff I have in my car that has passed Annual Tech since 2005, National Tech from 2006-2009 is no longer legal. I was told I had to use stuff that resembles SFI 45.1 stuff, but does not need to carry the SFI 45.1 rating. This stuff here: http://www.jegs.com/i/JEGS+Performance+Products/555/70002/10002/-1 meets the written word of the CCR. Why am I being told I have to trash the stuff I have? The cost difference is $14 per 3ft. I'll have to purchase 21ft of this stuff at $17.99 a stick for a total of $126+ shipping. Or use the same stuff I always have that will cost me $28. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gbrown8439 Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 Because the padding you are using is great if you bump your head on it and nearly useless in a severe impact. You should want to use what will protect your body not what is the cheapest stuff you can find. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 11, 2011 Author Share Posted February 11, 2011 Because the padding you are using is great if you bump your head on it and nearly useless in a severe impact. You should want to use what will protect your body not what is the cheapest stuff you can find. Thanks, but.... I'm not looking for anyone's opinion on this matter. I'm looking for an Official answer from someone in a position of authority. Keep in mind that this does not only affect me and my car, but many, many others that have already been built. We had over 100 race cars at the last event, and this recent interpretation affects every single one of those cars. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sterling Doc Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) It does not meet the rule. The rule states it should be high density padding. That is not. Edited February 11, 2011 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbuskuhl Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 CCR Rule:15.6.4 Padding All roll cage surfaces that may come in contact with the driver should be padded with high-density padding such as Ethafoam or Ensolite. It is recommended that padding meeting SFI specification 45.1 be used. I'll have to purchase 21ft of this stuff ... 2-3 sticks at 3' each will do the job. No way you "may come in contact" with 21' of roll cage tubing. I used 2 sticks at 3' each and more than covered the necessary areas. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 11, 2011 Author Share Posted February 11, 2011 CCR Rule:15.6.4 Padding All roll cage surfaces that may come in contact with the driver should be padded with high-density padding such as Ethafoam or Ensolite. It is recommended that padding meeting SFI specification 45.1 be used. I'll have to purchase 21ft of this stuff ... 2-3 sticks at 3' each will do the job. No way you "may come in contact" with 21' of roll cage tubing. I used 2 sticks at 3' each and more than covered the necessary areas. I have 3 row NASCAR style door bars at 3' each. 3 rows of spacing bars spanning the 3 NASCAR door bars (3' total) 2' FIA bar. 2' of bar to the left of my head above the window. 2' of eyebrow bar to cover. 1' for the A pillar bar. That is 17' if your counting. I'll need 6 of those sticks (18') to get 17' of pad. Think I'll be able to use every inch of cut-off's and find a place for it? Or should I order 1 extra stick to be sure I can cover everything? Still counting? Yep, that's 21' of pad. By the way, the car has over 80' of tube in it, and it is pretty much a NASA minimum legal cage. Not everyone races an RX7. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 11, 2011 Author Share Posted February 11, 2011 It does not meet the rule. The rule states it should be high density padding. That is not. I'll quote the description from the website from just below the Jeg's logo in the middle of the page. Special closed cell foam does not absorb moisture, but does progressively absorb shock. This flame retardant, high density padding features a offset hole that provides added protection and comfort for the driver. 36-inch lengths with 1-5/8" I.D., Will fit 1" (with some trimming) to 1-3/4" tube. Not SFI approved. Made in USA. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gbrown8439 Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 I'm really not trying to pick a fight over this and I understand you wanting an official answer but.... Why are you looking for an official answer to "what is the bare minimum I can do to keep from killing myself" instead of "I think I'll spend $126 to avoid being brain damaged if I get in an accident"? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 11, 2011 Author Share Posted February 11, 2011 The way I see it is the Snell rating on helmets is aquired using non-padded roll bar padding durinf testing. Anything added to the bar is an improvement on safety. I have felt plenty safe for the last 6 years running the stuff I used. In fact, NASA was fine w/ it as well up untill just a few weeks ago. Do you use the most expensive helmet available? Firesuite? HANS? Seat? If the answer is no, you must be insane, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gbrown8439 Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 Earnhardt felt plenty safe without his HANS also..... You are right though, I don't have the best of everything and I may be a little crazy. I guess I look at your argument in the way I would look at someone complaining that they can't use a motorcycle helmet. It just isn't up to standard and I don't think the "cheap" roll bar padding is either. There is some good data here if you want to read it. http://www.snikte.net/barpad.html Ultimately, it's your head. If you want to take the chance go for it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 I've been down the path that you are on before Glenn and I understand your frustration. You are seeing exactly what I saw with my cage and my seat - it pass multiple techs and the words in the rules didn't change year-to-year but a person of authority decided to change his interpretation of the text. If it isn't too painful, go back through your library of past rulebooks and you will probably find that these words didn't change (IIRC, that exact text appeared in the 2005 rules and I had to make the same judgement that you made for my bar padding with my old car). Just prepare yourself if you choose to assemble past-year rulebooks to support your position - it never helped me in the past. IMO, "recommended" was explicitly added to this text for a reason. If an SFI rating is required, it would say this. It explicitly says "recommended". "High density" is in the eye of the beholder (kinda like "high horsepower" - relative to what?) but in your case the manufacturer explicitly calls this out as a feature of this product. This should mean that you are OK. However, if your situation ends up like my old seat and cage, you are likely going to opening your wallet again without an intelligible explanation. During your argument, you will be distracted from the central question with the contention that "hey you don't care about safety, what's wrong with you". Don't take the bait. This has nothing to do with the intention and interpretation of the text in question. In the past, I took this bait and then you will find yourself arguing completely off-topic items. The only person that can explain the intention of this text is the man that wrote it. In my similar situations, that guy never got involved (best I could tell). I was just told that I didn't care about safety and needed to make "required" modifications. Good luck and report back. I think that more than half the cars out there have similar padding to the stuff that you want to use, including mine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 12, 2011 Author Share Posted February 12, 2011 I have read the CCR many many times over the years. I did compair 2005-2011 (my copies only go back to 2005). So I've seen the same rule not change. I could completely understand requiring SFI stuff around the head areas, and would not fight this if that was the case and the CCR said this. However, it does not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JWL Posted February 14, 2011 Share Posted February 14, 2011 Guys- Eric (Sterling Doc) had the right answer here. What we are looking for is the high density solid type padding. Just because a manufacturer states that their stuff is "high density" that does not make it so. We have been working on getting this information out to inspectors as there was some confusion on what was allowed. Hopefully it is not too painful to get the right stuff in the car and our only motivation here is to try and keep you as safe as we possibly can. If it was missed in the past, we apologize for this but going forward we do only want to see the molded padding in areas where you can whack yourself. Thanks. -JWL John Lindsey Chief Divisional Director NASA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 14, 2011 Author Share Posted February 14, 2011 Guys- Eric (Sterling Doc) had the right answer here. What we are looking for is the high density solid type padding. Just because a manufacturer states that their stuff is "high density" that does not make it so. We have been working on getting this information out to inspectors as there was some confusion on what was allowed. Hopefully it is not too painful to get the right stuff in the car and our only motivation here is to try and keep you as safe as we possibly can. If it was missed in the past, we apologize for this but going forward we do only want to see the molded padding in areas where you can whack yourself. Thanks. -JWL John Lindsey Chief Divisional Director NASA So when can we expect a re-wording of the CCR to help the Tech Shed uphold this new interpretation? And thanks John. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JWL Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 Interesting question. As written CCR does ask for "high density" padding so I am not sure how to make it clearer as to what we want to see. I can see there is some confusion but I am stumped as to how to clear it up! Any suggestions? -JWL Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kbrew8991 Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 the word "molded" wouldn't hurt - nor would a specific mfg and/or part number to add in as an example Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 Please understand - I am not posting this to be difficult. I am posting this to try to show that this thread could very well be making an impossible situation for both the guys running tech and the drivers that show up and get "dinged" for illegal padding. 1) Paraphrasing - the rule states that it is *recommended* that SFI rated padding be used. It also states that high density padding *should* be used. Neither of these are strong to begin with. If one were to parse this closely, the wording doesn't even say that padding is required at all. Should is not shall. Recommended is not required. So, whatever the writer intended and what is being enforced is not what is written. (Please don't inject a distraction claiming that I am saying that padding should not be used. I am just pointing out that the way the text is written, one could claim this and be correct.) ...regardless... 2) A question is raised about a certain type of padding, which the manufacturer describes as high density. 3) It is clarified that just because a manufacturer says it's high density, it doesn't make it so. The implication is that the suggested padding isn't legal because the manufacturer's claim isn't good enough. OK - who's opinion is good enough? So, we have a weakly written rule that has been unchanged for at least six years, maybe more. We are planning telling the tech people to enforce it better and the only way that this is known currently is this thread. If I am like most people (and I think I am in this regard), when the new rulebook comes out, I look for changes well in advance of the start of the season to give myself time to make adjustments. I think taking a different position on unchanged text is setting up some ugly dialogs at tech. No one likes or wants these. Is this really the circumstance that we want to set up for annual tech this year? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sterling Doc Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 (edited) Glen makes some good points here. Lots of soft statements in the rule. Having taken care of head injury patients (most of whom felt "safe enough" w/o motorcycle helmets), I'd recommend requiring actual SFI spec padding (vs. "SFI like") for areas that your head could contact, and only recommending (not requiring) it elseware. This should make the cost more reasonable, at much less risk, and be more clear, though we might need to define what tubes require SFI padding to be crystal clear... If you want to take a small (but real) risk of a broken arm/leg to save some money, OK, but lets make every effort to keep your skull in one piece Edited February 15, 2011 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kbrew8991 Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 Glen makes some good points here. Lots of soft statements in the rule. Having taken care of head injury patients (most of whom felt "safe enough" w/o motorcycle helmets), I'd recommend requiring SFI spec padding for areas that your head could contact, and only recommending (not requiring) it elseware. This should make the cost more reasonable, at much less risk, and be more clear, though we might need to define what tubes require SFI padding to be crystal clear... If that is enacted then right now I'd have to go re-buy padding just because mine doesn't have the SFI stamp on it, despite having the exact same super dense molded padding that is currently the best available otherwise. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sterling Doc Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 Yes, it would have been better to have the rule more clear to begin with, but Glen has just demonstrated that the current rule is too vague to enforce well. You "know it when you see it" it not a functional standard here. Got a better option? How does "molded" or "super high density" define? If there is a definition that the average tech inspector can use, that may be workable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 15, 2011 Author Share Posted February 15, 2011 Interesting question. As written CCR does ask for "high density" padding so I am not sure how to make it clearer as to what we want to see. I can see there is some confusion but I am stumped as to how to clear it up! Any suggestions? -JWL All the padding of the type you want us to use is SFI 45.1. So why not just require that? The words Ethafoam or Ensolite are not used in any of the padding manufactures descriptions. In fact, a Google search on those two words results in various other CCR like publications, but no padding manufactures. In short, as written, the rule is pointless. My sense of "high density" will likely be different than another's. I defaulted to a manufactures product description to determine legality - as we all do for most all the safety gear we use like Snell, SFI, FIA, and so on. So what is high density by your standards if your not requiring SFI 45.1? Compressible to x inches under x pounds of force would be a good start. Or require the SFI stuff which has already passed a safety benchmark. The stuff I use meets NASA published CCR rules to the word. It's flame resistant, drip resistant. It adds an improved margin of safety over the bare bar what my SA-2000 helmet passed (or exceeded). I called "high density". Who are you to tell Simpson Racing Products that their "high density" padding isn't so? Is this a case of "you know what I mean"? I meant high density like this, not like that? As I said before, I can understand if we where required to use this stuff around our heads, but everywhere our body can come in contact with? I also want to remind you of the financial impact this will have on folks who now are being told they have non-compliant padding. This will affect 100's upon 100's of cars. This will also make SCCA racers more hesitant to run w/ us since they have a lesser (much more so) padding requirement. So, before I go spend $126 on "expensive" padding for my newly built CMC car and trash my old stuff with-in the next week or so, are we sure someone somewhere didn't get their wires crossed and we have a miscommunication? And Ken, can you point me to the "correct" padding that does not have the SFI 45.1 rating? Is it cheaper? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kbrew8991 Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 (edited) And Ken, can you point me to the "correct" padding that does not have the SFI 45.1 rating? Is it cheaper? Apex Performance is where I got it - for every style of SFI45.1 padding they also listed a non-SFI stamped but otherwise identical and less expensive padding. They currently no longer list this however. Hmmm, and my other go-to race supply shops only list the SFI (and/or FIA) stamped high density stuff at the moment. The point still stands - requiring the SFI stamp doesn't necessarily mean a car that is any safer, just more expensive vs just requiring that same style padding over the pipe-insulation type padding Edited February 15, 2011 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted February 15, 2011 Author Share Posted February 15, 2011 I found it at Day Motorpsorts for 11.99. Looks like SFI stuff, even appears to have the SFI logo on the backing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bark3rd Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 I found it at Day Motorpsorts for 11.99. Looks like SFI stuff, even appears to have the SFI logo on the backing. This? http://www.daymotorsports.com/product/1763/%91HIGH-DENSITY%92-ROLL-BAR-PADDING Im on the market for some padding too, dont see anything about SFI on that product I was thinking of getting this stuff: http://www.stbarinc.com/orange-aid/index.html there is a good write up on padding safety on that link. $60 per 3', but eh, like the OP said, I drive an Rx7! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Posted February 15, 2011 Share Posted February 15, 2011 Yes, I supppose what I came around to is what was stated above - If padding is required and must be SFI-rated, then the rule is clear. ...and this is the part where I don't envy rule writers. Do you do this for the sake of clarity and deal with the complaining? Suggestion? Leave it alone for this year, with the provision that new logbooks will only be issued for cars with SFI padding and then update it for the 2012 season? (Just in case anyone is wondering - yes, I have a dog in this fight - I have a car I am prepping that doesn't have a logbook yet. I don't see SFI tags on my padding. I *think* it is high density - I am sure NASCAR teams didn't scrimp on this stuff - but when I roll into tech I have no idea what the tech guy is going to think. It would suck to have done all this work, for all these months only to be sent home from my first event because of my roll bar padding.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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