Monday I was on the slightly crowded 91 Freeway, heading into Los Angeles, when the unbelievable happened. In front of me was aggressive break lights, then the minivan in front of me becomes air born for a split second, before crashing back down onto the freeway, as debris flies everywhere, including broken glass.

I suddenly see a header panel from a house rolling in front of me and the reflexion of broken glass. I need to immediately dodge it to the right. I glance and there is a large truck with one of those hydraulic lifts on the back. I suddenly realize I have nowhere to go but to hit this obstacle in the road. It's large and probably won't clear my lowered car, so maybe it'll just get pushed out of the way…

WRONG!!! I got as far over as I could so as to only hit it with the drivers side, hopefully exposing only those tires to the hazardous debris. As I rolled over it, I could feel the rubber on my tires squeeze flat against my 19 inch HRE wheels. After rolling over it, the car actually felt fine. Other people where pulling over with blow outs etc. when I decided to pull over and check for damage.

I discovered both rims on my car were damaged with the front being far worse and losing air. I later discovered there was also oil leaking from the rear. It turns out this chunk of lumber clipped the oil tank on the driver side turbo, fracturing the tank at the mounting area. Not only did that happen, but the blow was so severe, it actually bent the mounting bolt that goes through the tank into the tank's mounting flange.

After the ordeal and arriving back home with the car, I decided to call HRE for a guestimate on the wheel repair. They stated $400 to replace one wheel half, or $650 for both. I need to get both wheels down to them in San Diego (Vista) for repairs. This has been very stressful to say the least. On top of all that, when I went to pick up the new oil tank from the Porsche dealer, they had ordered the wrong side, so I had to wait some more.

Enjoy the pics...

 

painfully sorry to hear. las freeways are as dangerous a driving condition as is possible. i can't say how many times I've avoided ladders chairs, bumpers from other cars mid-lane etc.. whatever...

could've been worse, consider yourself lucky in bad situation. i drove the 405 yesterday and got home ( finally! ) and said "wtf" for!?

 

Damn shame man.
The really sorry thing is that almost all of these accidents are caused by dumb *** driver error and could have been avoided in the first place.
One of the worst offenses are the people texting while driving. I see them every day driving the 91.

 

^ thats killing people every day!

 

The lady that was in front of me in the minivan was really having a serious meltdown. Her tire was flat. She was probably late 60's, no cell phone and was so upset, the poor lady didn't have a clue how to resolve her situation. I called her daughter and kind of helped her through it.

Traffic was to heavy for any of us to get the board out of the other driver's way. We just had to standby while others did the something, causing damage and blowing tires. That was really frustrating!!! All because some idiot wouldn't secure their trash onto or into their vehicle!!

 

.. apropos of that! if i EVER find myself behind a gardener or handy person truck with a ladder attached!?

my changing of lanes is, by now, an autonomic response.

but a gardener in la? what are the chances lol

 

Check with Wheel Enhancement. A friend needed his HRE's sent back and they put loaner wheels on his car.

 

Scary but could indeed be worse. I once drove over a solid piece of metal at 80mph when I still had my BMW. Something had fallen off one of those piece of sh*t trucks that "certain people" drive around. I didn't have a way to avoid it, so I could either hit it with the tire or have it go under the car. I chose the latter and it lifted the freakin' car over it!! I couldn't believe there was no damage!! It hit X-brace in the front and nothing else; I basically flew over it! Had I hit it with the tire, I probably wouldn't be here today...

 

I also dogged tons of **** on the hway, Chains, Tires from truck, 2x4's I think everything should be ENCLOSED, I've seen many things falling of the trucks, or pickups! I remember when my cousin visited me from Germany he said, you cant go on hway like that In Germany with stuff sticking out from your car- or you get huge Fine! Even you may think its secure , its not, because of wind. AND that happened when i was on the hway with him from the airport driving my Cobra,we hit piece of muffler was just laying there in the middle of hway... And yeah Rick that could ended up even worse---

 

The two craziest things I managed to avoid were a front tire that came off a semi ( saw the tire wheel combo just roll out from wheel well kinda cool to see) and a fork truck came off a flat bed and rolled in front of me. It could have been worse for you and hope its back on the road soon.

 

It pains me to see all that damage because of someones carelessness!!!

Best of luck in getting the car back on the road in a timely manner!

 

Yeah, there's a couple of things the German police don't putz around with and one is an improperly secured load. Bit of a difference in speeds, tho. Traffic allowing (which is less and less frequently these days) when I drive to work I get my 2+ ton Range Rover to 200+ kph (125+ mph). Ain't much swerving gonna happen at those speeds and brake distances go up exponentially with speed. So not having things on the autobahn is relatively important.

That said, especially on a holiday weekend, the traffic reports regularly have warnings about bicycles, roof racks, etc. on the bahn. Not so much construction equipment and such, tho, as most contractors here have large vans vs. pickups in the US. Maybe Mad Whip is right and loads need to be enclosed. I'm trying to imagine how a potential ban on pickup trucks would go over...

 

when i was a kid we all had pickup trucks, and anyone could ride in the back un secured. i started a furniture moving company called starving students and all the trucks were 25+ year old army jeeps and pickups with stake beds and such. barely anything was secured and we probably were smoking weird stuff on top of that. now ya can smoke but ya can't have an unsecured ladder hanging off the truck thankfully lol

those laws got changed and no one seemed to mind.

 

FYI- last time I looked....

If you hit the debris lying in the road, then that is Collision. Chargeable, deductible

If the debris flew out of the truck and hit your car in the front and then you went over it, Comprehensive, NOT chargeable, perhaps lower deductible.

OP, Check alignment and suspension ASAP. If HRE is doing the work, I'd be comfortable with their decision on reusing the centers.

GL

 

Yep. But if you file a claim, you will then have a dirty CARFAX. I had to ask myself if the claim was worth it. If the repair costs were higher, I might have considered filing a claim.