My wife hit a deer last Friday morning. I've been trying to get things going with insurance. Had the E towed yesterday to a local body shop, and now I'm waiting to hear from the estimator and the insurance adjuster.

I don't know what it takes to total a vehicle, and I don't know much about the structure of the E, but I'm hoping the insurance pays this one off. I'm not interested in a salvaged vehicle, but who knows...

From my inspection last night (I was out of town for several days), it damaged the front facia, lower bumper cover, passenger headlight, plastic fender, metal fender, A/C condensor & tubing, radiator, coolant overflow, washer fluid reservoir, and passenger door.

The passenger door won't open, the metal fender sits about 1/2"-1" away from the hood, and the plastic cowl is lifted about 1/2" from the A-pillar. I can also see that the engine box, which appears to be part of the body/frame is tweaked and paint is flaked/chipped, which is what appears to be causing the fender to push out at top... Oh, since there was no coolant, the temp gauge didn't read high, and she thought it was okay, so she kept driving another 30+ miles with no coolant...



more pix here:
http://s186.photobucket.com/albums/x40/closer9/

 

Wow! 30+ miles with no coolant! Did she make it home or did the vehicle burn out before then?

 

I am glad no one was hurt. thats the important thing! But I have to ask what happened with the deer. Thats some good meat for free!

 

Glad to hear she is ok. Yeah those are unibody so if ya treaked the structure any you stand a chance of getting it totalled out. From the looks of it though it can be repaired, but then again I really dont know anything about the body shop industry. Just seems like I have seen worse. If it is totalled out any idea what might be the replacement? Good time to buy right now with the holiday deals coming up

 

Don't know what happened to the deer. I didn't get back into town until 3 days after the accident. She didn't stop and pull over for a couple miles, until she could get to a business parking lot. She was afraid to pull over on the side of the highway...

She was on her way to work at around 5:30 in the morning, and it made it the whole way without burning up. I was very surprised when I saw it...

 

deer wrecks are pretty common in my part of missouri(northwest corner).. so i've seen a ton of them. plus my sister's father in law runs a body shop..from just looking at the pics i'd say it's fix able. from what i understand about the totalin' out process they go by parts, time,etc..v.s cost of the vehicle . but i could be wrong either way good luck.

 

You mean they will not let the repair bill reach the value of the vehicle because at that point they would rather pay it off?

 

from they way i understand it yes..

 

That's the way I've always understood it to be. I think its a certain percentage of the vehicle value...

 

that's right and with the cost of todays vehicles.. insurance companies hate to totale them out.. my sister in'law lives over by trenton mo, hit so many deer one month that her insurance company sent her a letter flat out stateing that they would not cover her deer claims any more.( but she needs to pay more attention anyway. )

 

That looks very fixable, provided the motor is not toasted.

BTW, there is a good chance the motor is OK, but you should get it checked out. If it had a small leak in the radiator, there would have been some coolant in it for most if not all of her drive. It could leak out later after the vehicle was parked.

If there were no coolant and the motor was too hot, I think the temp gauge WOULD read high.

 

There wasn't a small leak, because there wasn't really any radiator. If you look at the photobucket pix you can see the A/C condenser is sitting where the radiator should be, but the upper section of the radiator didn't move much... There was pretty much no coolant, except what might have been below the level of the pump or the break in the radiator...


It's kinda hard to tell, but you should be able to make out the top of the radiator right in the middle of the pic. Right below that is a black round rubber mount for the condenser, then the silver condenser below that. I "think" the black to the left is the actual radiator core...

The angle bracket to the right with the hole in the top is where the condenser mount should be...

 

Just reinforce to her that she did the best thing possiable. It's far better to hit the deer, than to try and avoid it! Things could have went much worse. Cars are always fixable or replaceable.

 

Thats also what I always assumed, just wanted to make sure I understood it right

 

that's true.. just hammer down and splatter the sumbitch(i.e deer) all over the place.. i'm just kiddin' but like you said it's better to hit then roll.. god how i miss the large heavy cattle guards trucks use to have..