Dr. Charles Manning on the appeals commission’s reasons for upholding the nascar penalty: “Everything they said was a bunch of malarkey.”
Besides owning company for 31 years, Dr. Manning also worked Mercury, Gemini, Apollo projects for NASA at Langley Field in Hampton.
Dr. Manning is “80 & a half yrs old” with a PHD in engineering. He has done accident reconstruction since serving in Korea in 1951.
But Dr. Manning says he told them “I didn’t test the right” because “the penalty was only the left side.”
On appeals commission’s contention that left & right rear hard points were high, Dr. Manning says both could happen in such an impact.
On there being not much damage to the Bowyer car (per Nascar panel), Dr. Manning also says his test showed the same. “You could hardly feel it.”
Dr. Manning says test simulated the incident w/6-10 mph push slower than at Loudon & still got displacement of 40,000ths of an inch.
On nascar telemetry not showing sharp impact from wrecker on Bowyer’s car, Dr. Manning said there wasn’t sharp impact in his test, either.
Wrecker-gate redux: Spoke with Dr. Charles Manning this afternoon and he doesn’t agree with anything in nascar appeals commission release.
RCR’s chances w/ chief appellant? Dunno. But John Middlebrook is a former GM exec. Word is, that Childress guy owned a few Chevys
Analyst critical of NASCAR's logic: The reconstruction analyst who testified that Clint Bowyer's New Hampshire Sprint Cup car was knocked out of tolerance by a wrecker labeled NASCAR's arguments against his findings as nonsense. Dr. Charles Manning of Raleigh, N.C.-based Accident Reconstruction Analysis said two tests of a wrecker pushing a car set up the same as Bowyer's winning #33 in the Chase opener showed the left rear end moved upward 40 thousandths of one inch. Testifying Wednesday on behalf of Richard Childress Racing, Manning told the National Stock Car Racing Commission that heard the appeal that his scientific study "clearly" explains the 39,000th of an inch NASCAR told RCR officials the car was beyond tolerances.
"They came out this morning and claimed it was negated by the telemetry which didn't show a very sharp impact," Manning said Thursday. "We didn't have any sharp impact, either. We pushed it easily. They said the visual inspection of the car showed nothing in the way of damage. Well, after we got through testing none of the cars showed anything of note or damage. They said the visual inspection of the postrace push showed they pushed very gentle. We pushed more gentle ... between six and 10 miles per hour. So what they said was a bunch of malarkey." Manning said the only way he can have more exact data than what he collected during the reconstruction at Charlotte Motor Speedway using a duplicate of Bowyer's car and a wrecker similar to the one at New Hampshire is to inspect the car in violation. He said NASCAR has not let him or RCR officials look at the car. "All we get from them is the stuff from behind closed doors," said Manning, whose company helped CMS win its case when a pedestrian bridge collapsed after a race in 2000. "I've been doing this for 45 years. When we go to court I've got photos and measurements. We haven't seen any photos. We haven't seen any measurements." NASCAR officials said they can't release specific data used to defend their case until the final appeal is heard.(full story and quotes at ESPN.com)(10-1-2010)