Rowan Atkinson McLaren F1 crash

[ttrw2]

All over the news today:



Happened a couple of miles from where I used to live, on a dead straight uphill section of A-road with a crawler lane....





Google Maps y000


What do we reckon? Over-ambitious overtake?

[rovermadman4825]

Nasty, was he injured

and what a waste of a car

altho if I owned it I would of crashed it years ago

[matthews2k]

I read this in the Sun Today.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/ne ... crash.html
Every car he gets in he stuffs. Stick to acting Rowan !!!

[t'mill]

Just his shoulder injured I think. He pranged this car about 10yrs ago too. If I remember rightly that incident cost something like 20k to fix, and it was just the bonnet and bumper that looked damaged. The wonders of Carbon fibre eh, sooooo cheap to repair

[ttrw2]

Ahhh yes reading that cronically pikey Sun article made me remember - he went under a Metro in this car before.....



Metro was driven away IIRC - back wheels just went straight up over the F1!

[t'mill]

Yup, that's the previous crash I was on about.

[matthews2k]

cronically pikey Sun

I have a look online from time to time.. I would never buy
Glad he is ok though. And it is Johnny English im sure it will be repaired in no time

[stefaclese]

I seem to recall that he was the only person in the world to have written off a Maclaren F1, and now he's gone and done it again

I take it this is the same car then? I wonder what an HPI check would come up with

[peteT16]

I know that stretch of road really well, most accidents there result from people crossing the double white lines into oncoming traffic, was it in in the rain or dry, but overtake gone wrong looks likely.

[Neilbaker86]

I saw him driving that car about a year ago in Oxford. Well, I'm guessing it was him, as there can't be that many burgundy P-reg McLaren F1s around...

[bjrespect]

he was after a 3 wheeler

[radddogg]

Ahhh yes reading that cronically pikey Sun article made me remember - he went under a Metro in this car before.....



Metro was driven away IIRC - back wheels just went straight up over the F1!

As bad as that looks there is very little actual damage. Just the fibreglass body panels, which you'd expect to come off worse in a crash with a steel shell.

[rovermadman4825]

Ahhh yes reading that cronically pikey Sun article made me remember - he went under a Metro in this car before.....



Metro was driven away IIRC - back wheels just went straight up over the F1!

As bad as that looks there is very little actual damage. Just the fibreglass body panels, which you'd expect to come off worse in a crash with a steel shell.

Well as said earlier its carbon fiber so cost 10 times more than fiber glass and shud be 10 times stronger

[David-Ti]

Apparently the car went straight off to mclaren to be rebuilt, quicker than Mr atkinson got to the hospital. No messing about!

It was only the other week he was talking about this car on top gear. covered something like 34k since new.

[paul888]

Edit : Going uphill lol.. on a side note rubbish colour for an F1 ...burgundy ,its not a MK2 jag ffs,glad he's ok .

[southside]

Yea didn't he say on Top Gear he'd never get rid of it aswell? then he goes and crashes it.lol

Sure he said he leant that one to Top Gear aswell when Hammond and the Stig had that race in Dubai?

[radddogg]

Ahhh yes reading that cronically pikey Sun article made me remember - he went under a Metro in this car before.....



Metro was driven away IIRC - back wheels just went straight up over the F1!

As bad as that looks there is very little actual damage. Just the fibreglass body panels, which you'd expect to come off worse in a crash with a steel shell.

Well as said earlier its carbon fiber so cost 10 times more than fiber glass and shud be 10 times stronger

carbon fibre reinforced plastic

So not full CF. It is extremely brittle, steel would crumple and absorb the impact, CFRP just shatters. Look at F1 cars, they as much as glance another car and the front is written off.

[Sheaf]

Meh, atleast he actually drives his supercar rather than the people who ponce about posing in their new lambos or whatever... he's got what is now quite a dated one, still loves it, still drives it hard.

[BlueRover]

"Good morning Mr. Atkinson, how can we help you ?"

"Have you got a new front end for an F1 ?"
"No sir, we'll have to make you one since you've already had the last one."

"Have you got a headlamp assembly for an F1 ?"
"No sir, we'll have to make you one since you've already had the last one."

"Have you got a windscreen for an F1 ?"
"No sir, since you've already had the last one, they're NLA."

[Punx0r]

Considering the crash-worthiness of metro's, I wouldn't like to be in a car that came off worse!

I doubt the validity of that Sun article, it claims: "A neighbour in the village of Apethorpe, Northants, where he lives with his wife and two kids, claimed he drives "like an idiot"."

I don't know who this "neighbour" is supposed to be, but there appears to be no such place as "Apeforth" anywhere in the world, let alone in Northants.

[stefaclese]

The Sun must've got their voicemails mixed up

As Alex says, fair play to him, that must be the highest mileage F1 about and he clearly still enjoys it

[Nom]

I saw Rowan Atkinson roll a car in front of the banking at Thruxton about twenty years ago. He was racing in a championship that was on the same bill as the Renault 5 Turbo national series. (If he wasn't in an R5 Turbo).

[jase]

Meh, atleast he actually drives his supercar rather than the people who ponce about posing in their new lambos or whatever... he's got what is now quite a dated one, still loves it, still drives it hard.

+1



And the damage is pretty cosmetic, yeh, lots of expensive carbon broke, but the structure is sound. The bonnet, wings etc are just aero devices, they arent meant to deflect or bounce off solid objects!!
Id rather be sat in a F1 than pretty much any semi-mono based car in a crash.

J

[Sheaf]

I dunno, I reckon that looks pretty bad.... half the car is gone

[ttrw2]

Looks like the engine/transaxle has gone AWOL there.

Lots of reports of the car catching on fire a few minutes after the accident happened. Given the mahoosive exhaust cans would've been sat in the hedge, I can believe that....



It doesn't appear to be that uncommon either....

http://www.autoblog.com/2009/06/02/devi ... alifornia/

If the tub is OK, that car can and will be rebuilt, McLaren have everything except tubs on the shelf. Even if it does have tub damage, usually whole sections of the tub can be cut out and rebonded in!

Wonder what his insurance renewal premium is going to be next time round....

[jase]

I dunno, I reckon that looks pretty bad.... half the car is gone

nah, a bit of Tcut and some araldite and itll be fine
Maybe a few self tappers for those metal bits hanging off





J

[BrackenFox]

Wonder what his insurance renewal premium is going to be next time round....

I think for someone well off enough to drive an F1 around on a regular basis, that's not going to be a worry.

[rovermadman4825]

Wonder what his insurance renewal premium is going to be next time round....

I think for someone well off enough to drive an F1 around on a regular basis, that's not going to be a worry.

True but if he has any sence he wouldnt bother getting the insurance company involved and just dig deep in your pockets

[t'mill]

I read an article that the full exhaust system for a these F1's cost 50k due to the high amount of gold used etc.

[jaguar82]

Now he can buy some proper car like SLR and throw that can.

[Punx0r]

You mean the Mercedes-McLaren SLR?

Keep trying

[jmurray01]

Don't give up the day job...