More annoying than anything, driving along minding my own business when 'bang!' like someone had hit the roof with a hammer.
Couldn't see anything on the dash cam, and I wasn't going under a bridge at the time but I now have a dent about an inch and a half across in the roof, with a central bullseye about 6mm across. Probably just enough crease to it that it won't pop out too.
Looks for all the world like someone has shot it straight down with a BB gun. Impact looks almost completely perpendicular to the roof and if so must have only missed hitting the roof rack instead by mm's.
Can't work out what's done it. My guesses currently range from bird dropping perfectly spherical stone to really small meteorite.
I can't post the photo but if you are intrigued and one to try and have a guess there is a photo here:
Worst part is it is just above the drivers door so I'm going to see it every time I get in.
Balls.
Golf course alongside that stretch of road?
Meteorite or frozen faeces from a plane.
I had a similar experience I put down to a branch falling from a tree. Never really sure what it was.
Freakin huge bang .. and I ended up swerving thinking I'd hit the side of the road or something .. right into a car coming round the bend.... luckily the mirrors just touched and the driver was angry as hell... so I didn't even get chance to tell him why i'd swerved .. but he couldn't even find a scratch on his mirror (it was that glancing)
Nope. No golf course. No tree cover.
Mixed housing estate / industrial set back 10-20m from road.
40mph dual carriageway, accelerating to 40mph from some lights had probably got to >35mph by that point.
Lat 52.5016 Long -2.1019 if you are so inclined to look at salubrious Dudley...
We had a tree branch fall on our bonnet, left similar sized holes in the bonnet & smashed the windscreen.
Actually, looking at it again, ours are not as deep.
Paintless dent repair? Had it done on one of my cars a few years back, charged £50 and got it back to perfect.
No idea, but it looks like a mini wormhole!
Going to ask 'Demon Dents' two doors down as he does paintless dent removal but I suspect the slight creased bullseye means it won't pop out.
At lest I hope he still does, I've just realised I haven't seen his van in a week or so...
Why bother fixing it? The hit by a meteorite story adds character.
Well there are only 216 left on the road at the last count and it was in really good nick until now ??
Now there are 215 standard versions and one that survived a meteriote strike!
Could have been worse, could have been a couple of kilos of meteorite:
[img]
Brick. Back when I lived in Beirut, sorry Bradford, lovely next door neighbour encouraged his small child to drop a brick on my car from their first floor bedroom window. Left a nice dent in the bonnet, complete with 5mm central bullseye
I've checked the dash cam footage again there's definitely nothing visible coming off the road (would have had to come off other carriageway as there was nothing in front as I was first of the lights and road was clear. Nothing obvious coming the other way.
I'm putting it down to a meteorite or a failed drone strike. They are obviously on to me...
Watched a wheel lug or something fly up from a logging truck and strike the roof just missing the windscreen.. it was amazing how that thing was a projectile.. however, if I'd been checking the mirror at the time I would've missed it. Insurance fixed under comprehensive for my deductible, no impact on premium
Wife got hit by a large piece of plastic yesterday that came over the central reservation from a lorry.. hit the car then she ran it over. Evasive action taken but to no success.
Whilst comprehensive covers missiles, animal stikes etc, unless we can prove the item didn't touch the road before hitting us.. its classed as a collision and loss of no claims discount!
Anyway, sh*t comes from all directions
Could it have been done earlier (whilst parked) and you heard a larger part of the roof/dent pop back up whilst driving?
It's was parked undercover in my work carpark so no-one could really get to it and the dent is right above the drivers door so I think I would have noticed it to be honest.
The bang it made was so loud I thought something had come through the roof!
Given recent meteorlogical events it could have been a golf ball sized freak hailstone ???
That's what someone else suggested but it would have had to come from a limited number of clouds in a mostly blue sky.
Also having inspected it there is a distinct inner depression About 6-7mm across with a almost creased rim, the large circumference of the dent seems to be due to the depth that it has pushed in.
Your problem will be the flipping - car roofs aren't designed for that.
[img] 
[/img]
What goes up, must come down! Any nearby Militia celebrating a recent victory?
Having seen half bricks flung from between twin wheels with alarming velocity, My money is on something small and dense (probably metal rather than stone) being chucked off a lorry wheel with a high arc. Wheel nut or similar. Thinking metal rather than stone because of the weird lack of paint disruption. Or meteor. Or blue ice.
Dudley = kid with a catpult firing ball bearings up in the air. I had a car with a hail-modified finish, the dents were wider and not as deep.
Make a feature of it by putting one in the same place on the other-side.
baby robin?
You barsteward
Personally I think Edukator and Cubist have the most likely explanations, I wouldn't be surprised if it was a BB or similar coming back down though it must have gone pretty high to make the bang and dent it did coming back down!
It sucks getting a dent in your car - especially the first/only. At the end of the day it is only cosmetic and you are bound to notice because you know its there; but the paint doesn't appear to have been compromised so long-term corrosion shouldn't be an issue. Repair likely to be costly as the metalwork has been deformed so won't pop back into shape..?
Metal (almost) never pops back into shape; stretching almost always occurs. This will be a fill n respray job. Or keep for character.
My in-laws Volvo is now considerably more aero after a French hailstorm. The hailstones were as big as gold balls, broke all the garden furniture and a few roof slates.
Tired - check you out with your gold balls as point of reference.
Just had a shufti at the photo - that dent is perfectly formed, whatever did that could only have come down vertically, and at quite a velocity, it's almost conical! Is there a rack on the roof? If that had been an object thrown up by a tyre, it would have almost certainly been travelling at an angle, and left a scuff mark - I've had a windscreen go, had something bounce off the bonnet then off the top of the windscreen and leave a mark on the front edge of the roof, and I've had two windscreens wrecked by objects while delivering cars, one cracked nearly three inches in from the right hand side, the other hit near the centre right and left a double mark, right in the line of view, and all of them I saw coming, pretty sure the last two were large bolts, judging by the double impact mark.
Never get used to the enormous bang when something hits the screen, though.
@ CounttZero it really looks like a vertical strike by something almost perfectly spherical. Dent is prob best part of 10mm deep.
If it did come down vertically then it missed the roof rack by 10-15mm perhaps. No evidence on rack of secondary impact from a richocet either.
Weird. Weird and really annoying.
My first thought was ball bearing.
Is the car a particular pride and joy?
I don't think I'd bother doing anything about a neat little dent like that.
But then I don't really care about cars.
Problem with a dent like that is that water might pool in it and if paint is cracked rust could start quite quickly. Probably best to get it fixed if keeping car for a while.
Nice Volvo BTW. I "heart" volvos, although mine is RWD so I heart it more. 😉
Good job it hit the car and not you, could have made a nasty dent in your skull 😯
Looks like the beginning of a black hole to me
@one_happy_hippy - certainly is weird, damndest dent I've ever seen, to be that perfect a shape, the object must have been both very heavy and fast moving, to deform steel in that way.
Really does look a bit like the theoretical gravity well around a black hole!
As someone suggested, it would be a good idea to rub the paint down with wet'n'dry, fill it with P38 body filler, then respraying it, otherwise that'll hold water and start to corrode.
Dunno about annoyed, I'd be bloody furious!
And it would nag at me for the rest of my life, wondering just what the hell could have caused it! 😀
@neweobdob thanks Ove had a series of Ovlov and this is by far the best. Still want a RWD striped turbo brick to go scare the drift massive with. And a two door 121/122/131 with a 230FT from a 960 in it. The R is only on 85k miles and I've had is from 54k, one former owner and the most ridiculous Full Volvo Service History you have ever seen so no intention of getting rid any time soon.
@CountZero it must have had enough pace that the vertical speed was significantly greater than the horizontal acceleration as the impact looks so vertical.
