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No matter how careful you drive or how much care you put into making sure your car is in tip-top shape, road use may eventually result in some kind of incident. Fortunately, if you have good quality components on your project car, major damage can be avoided for the most part. As we found out from Heidts, no one knows this better than Sean Hooie from Athens, Alabama. Although Hooie had a pretty significant run in with a pot hole in his pristine ‘68 Camaro last summer, it was the quality of his Heidts Pro-G front suspension that saved his car from significant damage. Heidts doesn’t have such a stellar reputation for nothing!
Hooie’s Camaro is incredible. Built by Harvey’s Classic Cars & Restorations, the car features a fully massaged LS7 engine, Tremec 5-speed transmission, and of course a full suspension from Heidts. This last part of the build proved to not only be a good choice, but also a major life saver for the Camaro.
After Harvey’s Classics finished up the high-dollar build, Hooie went to test drive his custom ride. With David Harvey, owner of Harvey’s Classics, in the passenger seat, Hooie took to the road to experience the new build for the first time. Going about 60mph, the two men came around a corner and spotted a significant dip in the pavement straight ahead.
Although Hooie expertly hit the brakes quick and then let off right before hitting the dip, the underside of the Camaro took the full impact of the pavement flaw at about 45mph.
While this kind of impact can be crippling for any car, the Camaro seemed to be unscathed when Hooie pulled it over to the side of the road. From what the men could see, there was no change in the door-to-fender gaps, nor was there any other indication that the car had been hurt. Still Harvey expected that something on the undercarriage was significantly damaged.
Upon putting the Camaro on the lift back at the shop, the men found quite the contrary. The Heidts Pro-G cross member had taken the brunt of the impact without even a dent.
The only damage that was found on the Heidts front suspension was that a couple of the bushings attached to the steering rack bolts had been split and the bottom of the components were a little bit scratched. Unfortunately, the oil pan on the car was not as lucky.
It’s good to see that Hooie’s Camaro was not severely damaged. Had he not had a Heidts front suspension on his car, we can only image the damage it would have sustained. Way to go Heidts for making a quality product in more ways than one!
