Humpy Bumper News UPDATE: The “Humpy Bumper,” an energy-absorbing safety device that was conceived and developed in Las Vegas, could be on the front ends of Winston Cup cars by the end of next month, according to one of its designers. Jason Schiers, vice president of Las Vegas-based Lew Composites, said the company soon will conduct one final test of the Humpy Bumper for Winston Cup teams at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, and then will begin producing the devices for interested teams. Schiers said the on-track crash test would be more of a marketing tool than an actual data-collecting exercise. Lew Composites already has turned over to NASCAR data from earlier computer simulations and sled crash tests conducted at the University of Daytona Research institute and General Motors. “NASCAR understands the quality of the product and have pretty much given us a green light to put the product on the cars.” Schiers said. Although NASCAR will not mandate the use of the Humpy Bumper, it has told the company that it won’t prevent teams from using the device in competition. The Humpy Bumper was designed by Lew Composites founder and president Paul Lew along with Schiers and Ted Love. The device, which is expected to sell for about $6,000, will be produced at the company’s plant at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway Research and Development Park. Made of a space-age unidirectional graphite fiber, the bumper has proven to lessen the impact on drivers during head-on and near head-on crashes, and will reduce the types of head and neck injuries that killed NASCAR drivers Dale Earnhardt, Adam Petty, Kenny Irwin and Tony Roper, Schiers said.(Las Vegas Sun)(7-13-2001) UPDATE: Winston Cup series director Gary Nelson said he hasn’t seen much testing data on the new “Humpy Bumper,” a front-bumper device made of a unidirectional graphite fiber that is designed to lessen the impact on drivers during head-on and near head-on crashes. The bumper, developed by Lew Composites of Las Vegas, has undergone computer simulations and sled-crash tests at the University of Dayton Research institute and General Motors. Officials at Lew said they recently turned over data on the testing to NASCAR. “Typically, what NASCAR does is not say much about projects in the development stages, and obviously that one is in the development stage,” Nelson said. “Like a doctor, you don’t want to prescribe medicine that could cause further problems, so we feel like we have a responsibility to the competitors. “Before we would mandate something, we want to make sure it doesn’t cause more problems. This is one of many projects in the development stages.” Nelson said it was too early to tell if the device, which costs about $6,000, would be mandated, available for teams to use at their discretion, or perhaps not be approved for us at all.(That’s Racin’)(7-15-2001)
