Quote Originally Posted by mr. black View Post
GBaker I see your point but what is the problem with having your equipment certified? I honestly don't know. It would seem if you did, from your perspective you would and do have the best product out there and a SFI rating would seal the deal.
The two are mutually exclusive. The SFI spec is low performance; it is the equivalent to putting a propeller on a jet engine. All the data proves it. We would have to detune our design to meet that spec.

As for your points

1. No one will take away anybody's equipment
2. Yes you would be forced to use SFI if you want to play in the sandbox, just like our suits, gloves, helmets etc.
So, which is it? You can't have it both ways. If there is an SFI-only mandate, SCCA drivers will have their Isaac systems taken away.

3. Side impact worries me for the same reasons as gran racing, if your belts come off (as you said) you have bigger issues to contend with and that would make the Rage a better product than all of them
The manufacturer will not release test data for the Rage. For all we know it increases head loads.

...and as for fire; that's why even in the current issue of Grassroots, practicing egress is stressed. The racer (forget name) got out with burns to his hands. But he got out. You really shouldn't find out that you have problem getting out with a SFI H&N during an actual fire.
Agreed. Most people who have a problem getting out with an SFI design find out day one, then hope they don't have a fire.

5-8. I find a stretch considering how long the SCCA has been around and how much safety stuff has happened.
That's an interesting point. In an simple scenario I would tend to agree, and plaintiff lawyers will normally start something like this with a test case or two. But if they believe they can convince a jury that parties have colluded to trade safety for money (which is how they would pitch it), the SCCA will only be a co-defendant. GM, which did testing stateside, Daimler, which did testing in Europe, every manufacturer/member of SFI, every sanctioning body/member of SFI, all 200+ HANS distributors, and the guy trying to sell you that Rage will be co-defendants.

Sure that's the extreme case, but if the target is juicy enough any mildly competent plantiff firm will do it because it costs nothing to add a name to the list. Trust me; I've been involved in 100+ mass tort cases on the defendant side.

Why take the risk?

Again, what's the deal with getting your product certified? Expensive?
Racing is cheap. Our background is aerospace and medical devices, where getting something out the door for less than $1MM is a good day. The data, from both the test labs and the track, forces us to conclude that the SFI design is dangerous vis-a-vis our design. It's very simple: We are not going to kill drivers just to make a buck.