Had a bit of an oopsie with the Ion last night that could be anywhere between an approx £200 repair and a write-off.
Without going into a lot of detail I drove into an unmarked traffic island in the rain and dark while turning at a junction. I say unmarked, because on Google street view (picture below) it shows a warning arrow post as being present there, but my Dashcam recording will happily confirm that the warning arrow/post is long gone before I got there!
The end of the traffic island is double curb height and was directly in my A-pillar blind spot, so in the dark and rain I didn't have a chance of seeing it when I'm busy scanning the horizon for oncoming cars. It hit pretty hard (albeit at only 10mph) then went right over the top. I pulled over and checked underneath, the only visible damage is the tow hook in the middle of the suspension sub chassis just below the radiator is flattened and there is also a dent/scuff mark in the same chassis rail to the left of the tow hook.
Unfortunately based on a quick fingers in the wheel arch test it seems to have pushed the front left wheel back by about half a finger and the left wheel is now towing out slightly. As a result the steering wheel is now significantly out of centre to drive straight ahead and the steering feels a bit heavier - presumably because the car is supposed to have 0-6mm toe in, not toe out!
I was still able to drive it home after checking there was no leaking coolant, damaged wires or battery pack etc. In fact apart from the small steering wheel offset and slightly heavier steering it feels absolutely fine to drive. I think I've been very lucky it didn't rip the guts out of the battery pack or bash the bottom of the motor or gearbox which does hang down below the level of the battery pack at the rear. I think after the initial impact on the chassis rail the wheel has climbed the curb and the rest of the car has passed over the obstacle without touching.
Unfortunately at this point I don't know if the wheel tracking/position problem is a bent lower wishbone arm (with the chassis rail scuff being visual damage only) or whether the actual chassis rail itself which has been impacted is bent, and that will decide what happens to the car.
A new lower control arm is £136 and includes bushes and bottom ball-joint all as one unit, so plus a bit of labour (I'm not going to do it myself, since the tracking will need doing as well) not too eye watering, and less or similar to my excess.
However if the sub chassis is bent then it's much more expensive. The chassis is available and mounts up from underneath (no engine at the front remember, just ancillaries and suspension) but at £369 plus presumably considerable labour and fiddling around to fit you're probably pushing £500-600 so into the realm of insurance claims.
Anyway, I'm taking it in to my local friendly garage who normally do my MOT's for a proper on ramp inspection and measurement tomorrow to see what the verdict is. If it's just a wishbone arm I'll order that or get them to order it and then have them fit it for me and set the tracking. If it's the chassis then I think I'm going to have to claim on insurance!
To complicate matters the MOT is due by 16 March which is now really close. In fact I was on the verge of phoning up to book an MOT just a day or two after this incident occurred.
A work college has suggested that it might be worth me pursuing the council for a claim based on the fact that the safety marker was completely absent. I'm not keen to post the Dashcam footage publicly but needless to say that even the camera struggled to see the dark, wet, un-marked raised section of traffic island from its high central vantage point that doesn't suffer from A-pillar blind spots. It's my opinion that had the safety marker still been there I would have clearly seen and avoided the island. If you can claim for damage from potholes, why not damage from missing safety signs ?
Edit: Just thought to review and save my Dashcam footage from earlier in the day when it was still light when I first arrived at the location - I drove past the concrete island and there lying on the ground about 20 metres further up the road was the missing marker!!
Not only that, the safety marker for the opposite stretch of road which is present on Google street view is also missing, presumably run over by someone. Not happy.
Over night it got down to -4C with 90% humidity so about -5C dew point. In the morning it was still -3C but the headlights were completely clear of condensation or fog inside. I then closed the rear hatches to seal them back up again.
However the EV's that I would potentially replace it with have all likewise gone up as well, pushing them tantalisingly out of my reach at the moment.
