[ERA 626]

Originally Posted by davids2toys

Back 7 years ago I had a crazy scary experience that almost cost me my life. I guess it was not my time and lady lucky was with me. I had only owned my ERA for 9 days after purchasing it used.While test driving the car and driving it home I did notice for a split second a very very light sticking of the throttle when accelerating in a turn or going into a turn or going up a grade from a dead stop. Thought nothing much about it at all and thought maybe because of the very light easy revving aluminum flywheel that was not like my first Cobra which had a steel flywheel. The next turn of events happened in no more than 2 seconds total. Long story short, 9 days later I turned into my very steep driveway and floored the car as I always had done in the past for that huge burst of power in first gear going up the hill. When I went to let off the gas, the pedal was stuck fright to the floor. I did everything I could just to keep control of the car and steer it away from my detached garage which i did but when it hit the gravel i did lose control and now the car was going sideways and ended jumping thru/over a small stone wall and landing in the gravel below about a foot away from a steel storage building. In looking at the pics, I am still surprised the car did not flip over. So after lucking out and with very minimal damage to the car, mostly cosmetic and 1 bent trailing arm, I started my investigation into what went wrong. linkage all looked perfect and functioned fine. I decided to check the motor mounts and the drivers side nut was still there but totally loose. This allowed the engine to lift up on drivers side binding up the linkage and locking itself there because of the Torque of the motor combined with being in 1st gear and the steep grade. I guess once I lost all traction in the loose gravel it freed up the linkage, unfortunately too late. I still have the feeling the prior owner/builder failed to ever torque this nut down that is why I was getting inklings of this problem even while test driving it. After this event and findings, I torqued the nut to spec and the whole throttle sticking issue was 100% gone! I have checked it periodically since then and it is still perfectly tight. I also did the bolt thru the motor mount safety mod. I love the look of the mechanical linkage, but since then, I do give everything a good look every once in a while.

I am glad you are OK, That being said I see issues with the events. #1 "flooring" a cobra in 1st gear? that alone is crazy... please dont do that...