Seat belts?

My kids learned in school to wear seat belts, and would nag me to wear mine. I would when they were in the car, but if they weren't I didn't. That changed for me when a Kansas City Chiefs football player, Derrick Thomas, was in a wreck a few miles from my house while driving his new Cadillac Escalade on a snowy highway. He didn't have his belt on and he was severely injured. He lived, but while he was in the hospital he had a blood clot and died. If a NFL linebacker in peak physical condition couldn't hold on during an accident, how could I think I could do it? I've worn my seat belt religously since then. Now it's so second-nature to me that I don't think about it.

I do notice the difference when driving my wagon and all I have is the lap belt, and lots of hard, metal surfaces around me to slam into should I get into an accident. The vinyl bench seat is great for cozying up with the ladies, but does very little to keep you in place, especially when autocrossing! I'm tempted to put in some better supporting bucket seats and a 5-point harness.

The older I get, the more I realize I'm not bullet-proof. When I think about it, I'm damn lucky to have survived this long.

 

Did anyone answer the original post?




Seat belts save lives. I know.
Fortunately I gained the wisdom as a 15 year old.

 

Krash, with as much respect as I am able to muster, todays cars have air bags for the driver and passenger and in some cars even the people in the back seat, anti lock brakes and crumple zones. Todays cars are built to absorbe a crash with minimal injury to you. They are built for safety. Granted you may get hurt, but by and large I think the odds are, youll live. Seat belts are annoying and pains to use. For me at least.


I see my 1962 Buick as a tank. Its not the plastic and fiberglass econoboxes they make today. Its a solid steel car. It can do some real damage to a newer car of today. My Buick will take a hit before I do.The steel body panels and frame I think makes up for no airbags or anti lock brakes. Its got drum brakes all the way around btw. I think its much safer then any car made today in fact.

I get these stupid tickets in my 07 Ford Focus hatchback all the time and just pay the fines.

 

27

The next time you buy eggs at the store, before you leave, place them freely on the seats individually. Speed up to 30mph and slam on the brakes. Let us know how the unrestrained eggs taste. Another simple experiment... Jump from your roof and land on your hands. If you can do this you may not need a seat belt to keep your face out of the windshield on frontal impact.

It is not about what kind of car; big, small, new, old... It is simply about inertia.

I HATE that there are seat belt laws but have worn them and advocated their usage long before the law. I guess the laws are to force those that do not understand physics to wear them and reduce costs of ignorance on society.

This topic is my only soapbox but again I do not advocate seat belt laws.

My apologies to original poster.

 

well let me tell you one.One fine morning off to work I go with my painting pants(the ones with the hole in the back wallet pocket)on and no wallet(I was hand bombing my wallet for 2 days while always forgetting it) any how I am driving down a road that I could have sworn was 60k and down in a small dip at a corner where I had never before or since seen radar is a cop.Well I didnt have my seat belt on and I am drinking my coffee and I am going 63k in a 50k zone.I swear they changed that speed limit the day before.Busted.The cop asked for my drivers liscence 135.00 fine. No seatbelt I think it was 175.00 fine. Speeding 175.00 A 500.00 start to my day. do you think I learned a lesson. it seems that if your looking for a cop you never see them but that one time and I always tryed to wear my seat belt but that was maybe 15 minutes into my day and out of the blue. ALWAYS WEAR YOUR SEAT BELTS.

 

Old cars are not as safe as you think.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPF4fBGNK0U&feature=related

 

I never would have believed that you think the old girl would have held her own

 

If I may borrow this thread for a moment, does anyone know if GM seat belts are right/ left specific?
Can I replace a worn out drivers seat belt with one from the passengers side?
How about front/ rear?
My car is a 1977 Buick Estate Wagon.

 

When I was looking for new seatbelts for Nora on here, I was sent links to a couple of websites where you can buy brand new seatbelts. The ones they showed were all based on the G.M. assemblies, so they should fit directly into your Electra. They were quite reasonable for price, too. I'd go new.

On a related note, remember, any belt in use in a crash should be replaced. The stitching is meant to give a little to absorb some of your momentum so the belt doesn't cause you as many injuries. That stitching only gives once.

On another related note, one of my friend's sisters claimed that a seatbelt would trap her in her car in case of an accident. What happened is that she was half-ejected from the car as it rolled, and her head was crushed between the roof of the car and the pavement. Her 3 children, in proper car seats, were not seriously injured.

I can pinpoint exactly when I started wearing seatbelts: 27 July, 1972, 3:34 p.m. Ma just took delivery of our 1972 Dodge Dart sedan, our first car with seatbelts. On those cars, if either front passenger was unbuckled with the car in gear, it would buzz non stop. Ma decreed that if she was wearing a seatbelt, EVERYONE was wearing a seatbelt. 40 years later, try to get me to drive in a car without it. I've been in, and seen, too many accidents to doubt the efficiency of a good seatbelt.

 

Texas law states...

"Sec. 547.601. SAFETY BELTS REQUIRED. A motor vehicle required by Chapter 548 to be inspected shall be equipped with front safety belts if safety belt anchorages were part of the manufacturer's original equipment on the vehicle.

Acts 1995, 74th Leg., ch. 165, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1995."

That said, my 1965 Biscayne I had in high school had no belts. It had little round pieces of red carpet glued very precisely over the bolts where the belts were previously installed under the front seat, and that was good enough for the inspector to say, "nope, no belts were in this car, you don't have to put any in."

I could tell the bolts were there, I could feel them under those bits of carpet. Previous owner didn't want belts. You needed 'em with a slippery woven vinyl seat and standard transmission, standard brakes, standard steering, column shift, foot pedal parking brake, foot operated high beams. Five floor controls in that car and no belt to hold you still so you can reach 'em!

That law came into effect after I traded in my car. I believe it used to say 1966 and up HAD to have belts and you had to use them, and if the car was built before 1966 and had belts already installed, you had to use them.

 

That video is extremely biased.
The 59 was a rust bucket and also an I6 engine so the impact was with nothing but empty fender and hood.

 

I believe most vehicles, if not all were LT / RT specific, with the 'adjustability' built in to the outer, or 'male' end of the belt unit.

I don't agree. The '59 looked pretty solid. And putting a V8 in there would not have changed the crash results much. No crush zones engineered into the '59 means that a lot more of the crash force gets transferred into the passenger compartment instead of being absorbed before it gets there.

 

The exception to the law is that anyone under the age of 18 must be wearing a seat belt, no matter what year the car was manufactured, including, but not limited to a Ford Model T. I don't agree with this federal law, but that is how the federal government got it passed. It is the minimum that any state seat belt law must require. The only state that I know of that has the minimum federal requirement is New Hampshire. They only require seat belts if you are under 18. Keep in mind that the federal government pushes these requirements on the states by telling them that if they don't comply, the federal government will withhold federal funds from them. To me, this is nothing more than extortion!

I don't believe that the shoulder harness was a requirement in all cars. I know that my 1969 Miller Meteor Cadillac Ambulance doesn't have shoulder harness's.
Another weird law was the one that required child seat anchors to be installed in all vehicles. It took over 10 years before the federal government realized that hearses didn't need to have these anchors and changed the law. Unfortunately, politicians pass laws that are very broad in scope, except that they always remember to exempt themselves from those laws that the rest of us have to follow. The double standard is alive and well in Washington.

If your car has outboard seat belts with built in retractors, they are specific to each side. If there are no built in retractors, then they are interchangeable. If you need your seat belts repaired or the retractors rebuilt, the company that does the best work is Ssnake Oyl Products in Texas.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZ3Y0lxGz6s

 

The buick I have didn't have seat belts rite off the factory. In 62 seat belts were an option, not required so whoever bought the car new didn't pay the extra money for added safety. I don't plan on ever installing after market belts either. That's fine, ill take my chances on getting injured or killed.

The federal law dosent apply to me since I never had children. I always ride alone