I wanted to chime in here on air bags in Nascar. I saw a couple of things in this thread that could use some straightening. First off, an airbag won't work in a Winston Cup car, or most any other race car for that matter. First off, the driver's safety harness is designed to keep his/her body from moving ANYWHERE. No sliding, no shifting, nada. The whole purpose of an airbag is to cushion the blow of the body moving in a passenger car. In a Winston Cup car, the body is held stationary by the safety harness and seat while the car crumples to cushion the blow. The only part of the body that is left free roaming are the legs, arms and head. The head is what should be fixed by the HANS device. One other point is that even if the airbag is set to inflate in a heavy accident, that is still the precise moment that they driver really needs to be able to control the car. When an air bag inflates your hands are thrown off the wheel. That's exactly what you don't want to have happen just as your car is on the edge of sliding back into 180mph traffic.
Cougar68
