Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car's been injured, HELP!

1195 Views 30 Replies 19 Participants Last post by miked_wz, Oct 22, 2003

krock

Discussion Starter · Oct 20, 2003

Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

Well, saturday night I was driving home taking a left when a cat ran out in front of me.

I, being a sucker and animal lover decided that it would be best (after a fresh rain) to slam my breaks, and swerve to miss the cat.

What ensued was terrible! I struck a pole on the side of the street and damaged my poor new car. There's no engine damage, there was no airbag deployed, and my gas tank shutoff didn't kick in.

Why am I telling you? Because I assume there's enough of you here that can tell me what exactly is damaged here, and if my $1000 deductable is better spent tossing to my insurance company, or if I should be replacing the bumper, hood, and sub-bumper(? i don't know what this peice acutally is, I assume it's the real, functional bumper as opposed to the peice of plastic for looks in the front

seen here - http://racinepdx.com/focus/pict0008.jpg .).

I've taken as many pics as I could to illulstrate the damage, I do have a desire for some aftermarket stylings for the car and I'm willing to drop my 1000 deductable on fixing the car myself if it would get me some of them. The pics are found here, http://racinepdx.com/focus/ any advice would be very welcome and helpful.

Thanks y'all.

See less See more

1 - 20 of 31 Posts

krock

Discussion Starter · #2 · Oct 20, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

Side note, my radiator is slightly bent, no leaking, I assume it's ok. Also, any opinions on how safe it would be to drive my car? I don't really have the 1000 dollars right now to just drop on this, it really couldn't have come at a worse time heh.

ax0n

· #3 · Oct 20, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

That sub-bumper is part of the FRAME. I'll guarantee you that all's a good deal more than $1000.

My suggestion: Just go to 3 or 4 body shops and ask if they do free estimates. Tell them that you're planning on paying out of your own pocket and they will usually go easy on you. You can always come back later on and use your insurance. If they know you're paying with insurance, some of the less scrupulous shops will add a few things here or there to get more cash out of insurance. Tell them you want an estimate to get it like new again and not to skimp to make the repair cheaper.

If you have any friends or family locally that needed body work, ask them who they went to. If they were pleased, check with those shops first. If they were not pleased, don't even bother getting an estimate from them. Body shops are not always "you get what you pay for". There's a shop out where my parents live that has middle-of-the-road prices, but does just about the best body work in the whole greater kansas city area. Some of the pricier shops don't even come close.

See less See more

DisrupTer911

· #4 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

um, whats the pre-determined speed for airbag deploytion(is that a word?)

Perhaps, you should be looking into why they didn't delopy on a head on collision with an object.

And yeah, if you hit that pole at any high rate of speed, you might have dmamged the entire frame from crumpling. I hope thats not the case cuz if thats it, the car might have to get totaled...but by the looks of it, seeing as how there is no engine dmg besides the crooked radiator, that may not be the case.

Airbags though, I wonder why they didn't deploy from the head on...

just my $.02

ax0n

· #5 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

ARG!!!

THERE IS NO PRE-DETERMINED SPEED FOR AIRBAG DEPLOYMENT! YOU CAN NOT SUE A CAR MANUFACTURER CUZ TEH BAGS DIDN'T BLOW!

Now that that's out of the system...

Airbags deploy when the car slows down at an insanely rapid rate, such as when hitting another car, barrier, building, or anything that's strong and stationary head on and coming to a nearly-instant stop. Even if they SHOULD HAVE deployed, Ford won't pay for you to get your car fixed, they're probably only liable for injuries that resulted from the failure. Since the owner didn't mention any serious injuries, I'd say there's not much Ford can be made to do.

If the pole was weaker than the focus, it's very possible it bent or broke, "cushioning" the impact of the car, and keeping the airbags from deploying, or it's possible that the focus wasn't moving fast enough to be considered a "life threatening" impact when it struck the pole.

venomrogue

· #6 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

two words

splat cat

krock

Discussion Starter · #7 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

Actually you can see in the pictures that the pole (which was a walk sign for the intersection) did in fact fall onto the hood of my car.

icemanZX3

· #8 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

you should have just ran the cat over...

after all, cats suck

Egz

· #9 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

after all, cats suck

They do not. But they arne't worth a car or your life.

l337raceryo

· #10 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

But they arne't worth a car or your life.

I'll remember that when I see your children out in the middle of the street.

Egz

· #11 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

But they arne't worth a car or your life.

Click to expand...

I'll remember that when I see your children out in the middle of the street.

I didn't say I would aim for them, but I wouldn't go crazy trying to avoid it. I've been there before, but with a rabbit I think. On a highway, at night, right after it rained, with other cars near me. Sure wasn't about to try to dodge it, and end up causing a big wreck.

See less See more

l337raceryo

· #12 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

Well I'll remember that if i ever see your children on the highway, with me going 90MPH, with a billion cars on the road, raining, at night.

Rob G

· #13 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

But they arne't worth a car or your life.

Click to expand...

I'll remember that when I see your children out in the middle of the street.

Click to expand...

I didn't say I would aim for them, but I wouldn't go crazy trying to avoid it. I've been there before, but with a rabbit I think. On a highway, at night, right after it rained, with other cars near me. Sure wasn't about to try to dodge it, and end up causing a big wreck.

I agree with Egz; and btw, you're comparing apples to oranges. there's a huge difference between a human life and an animal, and we're dealing with an animal in this crash scenario NOT a human.

See less See more

NationwideClyde

· #14 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

But they arne't worth a car or your life.

Click to expand...

I'll remember that when I see your children out in the middle of the street.

Geez! People who equate the lives of dumb animals with the lives of human beings truly grate on me. Human life is irreplaceably priceless. All animals (and all other things on the earth, really) are merely property; extending the shelter of rational justice to creatures genetically incapable of reason endangers the entire foundation of law.

At any rate, sucks about the ZX5 and if in fact part of the frame is tweaked, it's not gonna be cheap. There may be shortcuts to getting it back together again, but it'll never be the same.

Egz

· #15 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

Well I'll remember that if i ever see your children on the highway, with me going 90MPH, with a billion cars on the road, raining, at night.

Man you need help...

Anyways, we've strayed OT enough. I agree with Disrupter, that the front crumple zones could be comprimised. Get a couple of estimates first.

See less See more

ZXmurph

· #16 · Oct 21, 2003

2

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

Anyhooo......I remember my brother and I telling a "cat" story when we stacked Dad's car...

come one dude, you can tell us the truth

See less See more

blueovaldave

· #17 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

My estimate from the pictures is $2500 - 3000 minimum. Could be more once they start pulling stuff apart. You need hood, bumper, radiator, radiator support, pull the frame at a minimum. Probably A/C condensor and one line if not both. You have a good claim that will eat up your $1,000 and more.

See less See more

Medic541

· #18 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

Don't forget the the invoice you will be getting from whoever owned the pole along with the labor to replace it. File the insurance and limit you losses to 1 large.

When I went ice skating with my Escort in February and took out two trees and part of a guard rail. Total invoice from the City of Aurora (IL) $400. They tried to bill for the guard rail, but I had been driving that same way every morning for 6 years and it wased smashed the first time I passed it. Talked to the City Attorney and told him to take the guard rail off my invoice or I'll supply the insurance with 2000+ people who will testify that its been smashed before and get the Beacon-News (local newspaper) to reprint all the crash photos they have from that spot on the front page. (Okay, were near Chicago, but this is small town in spirit. My son came home from school one day and told us about a gun scare at school. I called the school and got stonewalled. So I called the newspaper and said what gives. It was the first they heard of it and they were sending a reporter. [No gun was involved, just a torqued off kid using big words {wonder how he enjoyed his overnight in jail?!} ] the next day it was front page news in the paper. Talk about a freaky feeling, short call to the paper and your reading it in the newspaper the next morning in the driveway.) OH!! that guard rail! yes it has been smashed. We thought it was the one on the other side of the street. So, I'm up one guardrail.

See less See more

Penguini66

· #19 · Oct 21, 2003

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

While everybody seems to be in the mode of suing everybody. Maybe you can find the owner of the cat and sue him for the deductible. Afterall, it's his fault that his stupid cat was out walking in front of you.

See less See more

Medic541

· #20 · Oct 21, 2003

5

Re: Cat > Me > Pole > Focus. Or, My car\'s been injured, HELP!

<font color="red"> WAIT! WAIT! </font>

PeTA should pay for it. You saved the cat!!

See less See more

1 - 20 of 31 Posts

This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.