I was at the display at Wivenhoe Dam today, 19 July and for the most part was impressed. What did concern me was two HQ Monaro coupes with 4 point racing harnesses fitted. Apart from being illegal, any car fitted with inertia reel seat belts from new must retain them at all times. The real concern is that both cars had the shoulder belts mounted to the floor behind the seats. Harness belts must be mounted with the shoulder straps as near as possible to horizontal, the rear parcel shelf or roll bar. You can mount them to the floor if there is a cross bar in the roll cage behind the seat at shoulder height. Just sitting in the car with the belts mounted to the floor behind the seats might feel OK but when you have an impact from front or rear all the force is transferred to your body and therefore the seat back because which is not designed to stand the G forces. Your body weight increases by anything up to 10 times in a major impact. Mounting them on the parcel shelf brings other issues such as you can't have rear seat passengers. Harness might look good but there are a lot of issues when fitted to street cars. Have a look at any race car and you will see what I mean.

Lazlo.

Lazlo,
I am responding to your posting on the forum, as being the owner of one of the vehicles you were refering to I thought I might clarify a few points you mention.

Firstly you refer to inertia reel replacement to harnesses being illegal, this maybe true but my Monaro was a 6/1971 build which came from the factory with lap sash seat belts (fact).Secondly, I believe that 4 point harnesses are leagal in the state of Queensland if installed correctly.

I appreciate you concerns for the safety of the drivers and I am astounded that you did not approach the drivers on the day to inform them, but waited until 6.00pm that night to post them on the forum. I was hoping to come home and see a lot of positive feed back about what a great day it was for MCQ, to see all of the cars in their glory, great social event for club members, but instead I see negative comments.

I built the car for my own pleasure and taste, not to impress anyone or to fill up my garage with trophies, not to trailer it to shows or club runs but to drive it.I know that the over shoulder harness may be installed wrong but I feel safer with these harnesses on in an accident than the factory lapsash belts.

If you wanted to, you could have found faults with about 30% of the cars on the day (i.e. tyres, scoops, washer bottle etc) but this was all you could find????? I would look forward to seeing you on our next outing to discuss you concerns in further detail and see your car in all of its glory (legal of course).

well said. lazlo could have looked at my car and found dozens of things wrong. 1st being no side mirrors. oops thats against the law is it not. i had a great day plenty of nice nice cars and 1 or 2 dirty ones.if lazlo only found fault with yours the day must have been a winner. GRUMPY

Hi Grumpy, good to see you enjoyed the day as I did. Great people enjoying the cars and everyone's company, A rare thing in this day and age. Hope the next pointscore is as good as this one was.

PRO071