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Unfortunately, it seems that no one in the world but me can drive properly. Consequently, since I have had my RX-7, it has been subject to 7 accidents. There are only 4 worth mentioning, so I will cover those only. And yes, this page names-names. I think that it is important for bad drivers to be exposed and publicly ridiculed. They are some of the most dangerous people on this planet.
It was one month after I bought the car. I had stopped at Tim Horton's to pick up so doughnuts, and the day promptly got a lot worse when I exited the store. As I walked to the car, I found that the passenger front fender now contained a very large dent, complete with paint that had been scraped off and damaged trim. The only thing I can assume is that from the height and size of the dent, the truck beside me tried to quickly leave his/her (probably her) parking spot and scraped along my car and a decent speed. No one saw what had happened (of course), so I was stuck with the cost of replacing the fender. Luckily, next spring I had planned to paint the car anyway, so it is not was bad as it could have been. Sorry, but I don't have any pictures. We all know what a dented fender looks like anyway.
After spending the entire summer (July until November) in the process of painting the car, you can imagine that I was more than a little angry when Christy Mangot of St. Catherine's Ontario sideswiped me as I was coming home a from a job just a little after 5PM. I was heading south down Adelaide St. (one of the main streets in London) and had just passed a crosswalk/intersection when she decided to change lanes on top of me. Her Isuzu truck impacted my front driver fender destroying the fender, front drivers suspension, bumper, wheel and tire (brand new Bridgestone Blizzack snow tires) and washer fluid reservoir. The impact forced me into the curb as I had lost steering control due to the broken tie rod. Luckily, nothing else on the car was damaged. But the worst part is, that after I got her name and license number, she just took off! Stupidity was on my side, as she later reported the collision to the police reporting center. After my insurance company and the police determined it was her fault (for not only changing lanes in an intersection, but also driving with 3 people and only two seatbelts and hitting me), my insurance covered the damages.
However, that was not the end of it. While the car sat outside of my mechanics one weekend waiting for the suspension work, some drunks from a local bar came by and kicked it of the jackstands supporting the front end. The result? Several large dents and tears in the passenger front fender, as well as a pair of crushed jackstands and a crushed brake line. This was covered by insurance as well.
To add insult to injury, the rental they provided me with was a 2000 Ford Focus....wagon! Everyone had a good laugh about that one.
This one is truly bizarre. I had stopped at a light behind a black Ford Excursion (huge!) with about a car length between us. As I was sitting at the red light, the reverse lights suddenly lit up on the Excursion. By the time I had my car into reverse and checked that the coast was clear, the Excursion had backed up over one car-length directly into my front bumper. His trailer hitch impacted my license plate, destroying the plate, the bracket and damaging the paint.
We pulled into a nearby parking lot, where I learned that this geniuses name was Adam Dieter Edwin of Edmonton Alberta (home phone number 1-780-463-4203). I never did get a straight answer out of him as to why he backed into me, but because the Excursion was a rental, he asked if we could settle this without insurance. Mistake number 1: I agreed.
About a week later I had an estimated cost of repair of around $500 (new plate, bracket, bumper repaint, rental car for 2 days) and faxed him a detailed quote. Called to make sure he got the fax. This was the last I heard from Adam Edwin. After making several calls, and in fact informing his wife of the accident (he never told her...hehehe) I finally told left a message that I would wait one more week to hear from him, then I would file in small claims court (which meant for him, a trip from Edmonton back to London). Low and behold, within 24 hours he called back, asking me to re-fax the quote because he "did not get it" (yeah, right). So I did...and waited. And waited, and waited. Several more phone calls went unanswered, at which point I simply left a message saying I would be at the court house by noon the next day to get the necessary papers. And I did. Unfortunately, it was a very busy time in my life and even after I filled out the papers I did not have time to file. And quite frankly I don't need another hassle. So I didn't get time to file the papers, and when I did, I was told that it was too late. Mistake #2: procrastination.
I bit the bullet and replaced the license bracket and the plate at my cost, but the bumper still needs to be repainted. Fortunately, the scratches are mostly hidden behind the plate.
So there are three lessons to be learned here: 1. always call the police in the event of an accident. 2. do not procrastinate with court papers. 3. This is the most important one: do not hire or trust Adam Dieter Edwin of Edmonton Alberta under any circumstances. He is dishonest, lazy and a criminal.
June 25th was a nice sunny day, and I was on my way home after looking at purchasing an '85 RX-7. I was heading down Dundas St. (major downtown street in London) towards the core of the city. The light turned green and I accelerated away from the intersection, only to have the car in front me (an off-duty police officer) come to a quick stop because the person in front of him made a sudden decision to turn into a parking lot. I came to an abrupt stop behind the car in front of me, and thought all was well. Ah, what a fool I can be. Apparently, Kelly A. Lewis of London Ontario had not noticed that the very red and very loud RX-7 in front of her had come to a complete stop. How she missed this fact is beyond me, since both my brake lights were showing 4 large bright red circles, and I had the stereo cranked blasting "Rammstein - Spielhur" at full volume. Oh yeah, and my car was not moving. Regardless, she ran right into my rear end at around 40 KPH. Luckily I still had my foot on the brake, so my car stayed relatively stationary. My neck snapped forward, and the music promptly stopped. I then killed the engine and walked to the back of the car. Now, you have to understand that I was angry enough that I would have literally killed her had there not been so many witnesses. But I didn't say a word. I simply walked around the cars, surveyed the damage, and then stared at her. By that time, the off duty officer in front of me had taken control of the situation, and ushered off the road. From the fact that he kept asking me to get in the back of his car, I would assume that he saw the murderous red glow in my eyes. As a side note, I guess her child seat worked since I didn't see her baby splattered on the windshield of her Corolla.
As I waited at the side of the road for the tow trucks, I noticed the fuel dripping from the rear of my car. Apparently the impact had broken the fuel return line. It was a good thing there were no sources of ignition around, but the fire department was called as well as the HazMat team to clean up the spill.
The car was towed to my house, where I took the pictures below. As you can see, the impact pushed the entire rear end of the car forward about an inch. The bumper was destroyed, as well as the taillights, drivers side exhaust, spare tire and well, some interior trim and drivers side shock (hit by exhaust pipe as it crushed).
The insurance appraiser was going to total the car, but after a little convincing agreed that they would fix it if I upped my coverage and agreed to pay for the fuel line repairs (more expensive than it sounds). It spent a month in the body shop, but they did an excellent job as always. Damage not covered by the insurance included a new motherboard for the MP3 player (old one cracked) and a new DC-DC power supply for the MP3 player.