First Impact suits
http://www.insidetopalcohol.com/showthread.php?t=22813Then the HANS clips
http://www.dragracingsafety.com/articles/article-4.htmlNow this.
The whole point of the label is trust and adhering to the rules.
The company is selling suits that are labelled SFI approved. This means YOU pass inspection at the track.
If they are forging the tag, they are defrauding SFI for the tag price (which funds the testing) and YOU since the suit does not meet the requirements needed to pass tech (a proper SFI label)!
It has been said here and on other forums that this is a head-butting contest, but for all that have this equipment, you are the ones that are losing due to the cost of replacing the equipment in a short amount of time and at your own expense.
As to why SFI has not pulled the stuff right now, my uneducated guess is that it was done this way for the following reasons:
1. To allow time for Impact to defend itself in court. If this were not allowed to happen, SFI could lose and would be responsible for any and all expenses and slander. Innocent until proven guilty.
2. To provide a bit of time (although not enough, judging from other forums) to let the racers comply and not halt all SFI spec racing.
3. So that the extent of the issue can be narrowed and defined. Say you have a suit that is manufacturered to the standards and does have the SFI tag. You would rightly expect to be able to use the suit or have someone replace it with one that does. If your suit does not pass the standards (which requires destructive testing to really be sure), it doesn't matter which tag is on it, Impact is to blame.
4. If SFI had not given some sort of notice before this went to court or before they yanked the certification, there would be a lot of people asking why they didn't give any notice. They came out now AND provided a cut-off date.
IMHO, Any company that sells something as legit that is a forgery is committing fraud, whether the item is safe or not. The label is part of the requirements for the item to be sold as certified, and the comsumer is purchasing the item to comply with the certification and be legal to particapate with a scantioning body that has adopted those certifications in it's rules.
http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/fraudFraud must be proved by showing that the defendant's actions involved five separate elements: (1) a false statement of a material fact,(2) knowledge on the part of the defendant that the statement is untrue, (3) intent on the part of the defendant to deceive the alleged victim, (4) justifiable reliance by the alleged victim on the statement, and (5) injury to the alleged victim as a result.
http://www.sfifoundation.com/Who Uses SFI Standards?
Manufacturers of equipment are the primary users of SFI standards.
Some standards are adopted as part of the rules of race sanctioning organizations. It is important to keep in mind that any such use of counterfeit labeling is in violation of the SFI specification programs.
Under the Contracts of Participation between SFI and Impact, SFI conformance labels and patches may only be obtained from SFI and no other source. Evidence shows that Impact had counterfeit SFI labels and patches made in Asia and then affixed them to Impact products it distributed to members of the racing community.
