Mini cars don't fare well in collisions with mid sized cars!

WASHINGTON ? Micro cars can give motorists top-notch fuel efficiency at a competitive price, but the insurance industry says they do not fare well in collisions with larger vehicles.

In crash tests released Tuesday, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety found that drivers of 2009 versions of the Smart "fortwo," Honda Fit and Toyota Yaris could face significant leg and head injuries in severe front-end crashes with larger, mid-size vehicles.

"There are good reasons people buy mini cars. They're more affordable, and they use less gas. But the safety trade-offs are clear from our new tests," said Adrian Lund, the institute's president.

Automakers who manufacture the small cars said the tests simulated a high-speed crash that rarely happens on the road. They also said the tests rehashed past insurance industry arguments against tougher fuel efficiency requirements. The institute has raised questions about whether stricter gas mileage rules, which are being developed by the government, might lead to smaller, lighter vehicles that could be less safe.

"If you were to take that argument to the nth degree, we should all be driving 18-wheelers. And the trend in society today is just the opposite," said Dave Schembri, president of Smart USA.

Sales of small cars soared when gas prices topped $4 per gallon ($1.05 per liter) last year but have fallen off as gasoline has retreated to about $2 a gallon ($0.53 per liter) and the economic downturn has slowed car sales. The small cars are affordable ? prices of the three cars tested range from about $12,000 to $18,000 ? and typically achieve 30 miles per gallon (13 kilometers per liter) or more.

The tests involved head-on crashes between the fortwo and a 2009 Mercedes C Class, the Fit and a 2009 Honda Accord and the Yaris and the

2009 Toyota Camry. The tests were conducted at 40 miles per hour (17 kilometers per liter), representing a severe crash.

In the fortwo collision, the institute said the Smart, which weighs

1,808 lbs, went airborne and turned around 450 degrees after striking the C Class, which weighs nearly twice as much. There was extensive damage to the fortwo's interior and the Smart driver could have faced extensive injuries to the head and legs. There was little damage to the front seat area of the C Class.

Schembri said the test simulated a "rare and extreme scenario" and noted that the fortwo had received solid ratings from the government's crash test program. The fortwo has received top scores from the Insurance Institute in front-end and side crash tests against comparably sized vehicles, but in the front-end tests against the C Class, the institute gave the minicar poor marks.

In the Fit's test, the dummy's head struck the steering wheel through the air bag and showed a high risk of leg injuries. In the vehicle-to-vehicle test, the Fit was rated poor while the Accord's structure held up well.

Honda spokesman Todd Mittleman said the tests involved "unusual and extreme conditions" and noted that all 2009 Honda vehicles had received top scores from the Insurance Institute.

In the Yaris test, the institute said the mini car sustained damage to the door and front passenger area. The driver dummy showed signs of head injuries, a deep gash on the right knee and extensive forces to the neck and right leg.

The Yaris has received good ratings in past front and side testing but received a poor rating in the crash with the Camry. Toyota spokesman John Hanson said the car-to-car test had little relevance to consumers because of its severity.

"It's fairly obvious that they have an agenda here with regard to how smaller cars are going to be entering the North American market in larger numbers," Hanson said.

Reply to
Steve W.
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Once again proving what most of us already knew: it is better to be on the bus than in the Civic at the moment of impact!.

Lugnut

Reply to
lugnut

"Steve W." wrote in news:gs2rve$1he$ snipped-for-privacy@news.eternal-september.org:

Hardly ground-breaking news that is. However the bigger you get, the worse they are at handling. So if you buy an suv and drive at the speed limit, you'll have more accidents. Without paying for it in injuries. Nice.

Reply to
fred

Sounds like a good tradeoff to me. Those of us who have some sense can be safe in our large, heavy vehicles while the stoopid hippies in their ludicrous "green" cars (aka "tin cans") pay the price for their foolishness.

I don't see the problem.

Reply to
Roger Blake

Well, I have had small cars all my life, and I am 71 already. So if I am so stupid I must be quite lucky. I also just bought a green car. It is larger and heavier than many of the cars I have already owned.

BTW, as someone else said, those small cars of mine have definitely been the best handling.

Reply to
Don Stauffer

yup, the way I look at is the smart people can get away with driving small, fun cars and the incompetent drivers have to drive the big barges to keep from meeting an untimely death. That said I do have an F-150 for dump runs, but 99.44% of the time it is sitting in my driveway collecting holly berries on the hood.

nate

Reply to
Nate Nagel

And smart people can also drive big powerful cars or SUVs with limited handling capabilities because they don't put themselves in all the stupid situations that the people who drive annoying little red roller-skates put themselves in. Such as decapitated under an

18-wheeler after trying to zig-zag through traffic to get somewhere 30 seconds sooner than just staying in a lane.

The key in any event is driving intelligently.

Reply to
Steve

There is/was/used to be a guy who lived about nine miles from me, this was back in the 1970s.He used to have three Vespa mini cars (I think they were Vespas) sitting in his yard.I used to think someday I would ask him if one of the cars was for sale.The cars aren't there anymore.I have lost interest in them anyway.About fifteen miles further South, I used to see one of those first models of a Suzuki car sitting in front of an old abandoned house.It looked like it had been sitting up for quite a few years.Little bitty Suzuki car, I think it had a two cylinder engine, but I didn't stop to look closely at that car. cuhulin

Reply to
cuhulin

So, if you drive a small car, don't go around hitting big ones.

Actually, don't go around hitting anything. I recall reading some statistics that stated more accidents are single car rather than multi-car. So, how well do small cars hold up when hitting 'terrain'? Anecdotally, I'd say, "Not well".

Back when I worked for the local power company, I went out on a call involving a pickup truck running off the road and hitting one of our poles. When I arrived on the scene, they were pulling a 3/4 ton GMC back onto the roadway. Before I could get around to look at its front end, someone got into it and drove it off. The pole was sheared off at the base.

A week or two later, one of my co-workers returned from a 'similar' accident, where a compact car left the road and hit a similar sized pole, traveling at a similar speed. They didn't know how many bodies were in the car until they peeled it off the pole (I was glad I wasn't called out on that one). The pole survived.

Reply to
Paul Hovnanian P.E.

[snip]

I'd like to know which object the vehicle struck that changed its momentum the most.

But, 'hit the curb first' is useful information in that it indicates where control was probably lost. After that, the concrete bridge supports are just icing on the cake, so to speak.

Reply to
Paul Hovnanian P.E.

I don't see a clear explanation in the text, but the diagram and captions on page 3 of

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seems to imply that they were testing a 40-on-40 offset collision, not the 40-on-barrier collision used in the earlier ratings. Not that the latter is an experience to look forward to, but the former entails a serious risk of ruining my entire day no matter what I'm driving. Rather than simply "don't drive small cars," the conclusion I take away from this is "microcar manufacturers could improve protections against passenger-compartment intrusion."

The most basic physics can't be helped, of course -- the little car is still going to decelerate fast and end up going backward when the bigger car hits it -- but there are bigger things out there than anything I might reasonably use as a daily driver, and I really am much much better off seeing and avoiding them than getting into an arms race that from some perspectives actually turns me into one of the threats.

What I'd like to see is some statistics-based (plus or minus the data integrity problems someone else summed as "the deadliest thing to hit is the curb") operations research that looks at both severity and likelihood of various kinds of crashes. This might be a bit more rational even if it is not able to include the likelihood of successful evasive action in various kinds of vehicles. Yes, if some nutball crosses the center line on me and I can't take any effective action before we hit at a vector sum speed of 80 mph, I'd rather be in a Suburban than a Smart -- but does it make sense (individually or societally) to highly optimize everything for one low probability scenario?

In other words, as in all economic decisions, we have to ask not only where are the maxima, but where's the sweet spot?

--Joe

Reply to
jtchew1

z wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@d14g2000yql.googlegroups.com:

And a Corvette weights in about 300 lbs more. Power to weight and lateral G. Therein lies the key.

Reply to
fred

fred wrote in news:Xns9BF4EB5B91F4Dfred@127.0.0.1:

@d14g2000yql.googlegroups.com:

Ha ha ha where you going to find that light a corvette????????? They start at about 3400 in a older one and go up to 3800 for a newer one. KB

Reply to
Kevin

Kevin wrote in news:Xns9BF5890428DA6kevyNOSPAMnetinsnet@167.142.225.136:

The ZR1.

Reply to
fred

z wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@g19g2000yql.googlegroups.com:

Chevy *estimates*? they don't know? Besides, isn't that the number I was given for a stock Corvette? surely *that* numbers going to be higher. BTW

2009 models came out last *fall*, which means they're bulding 2010 ones now. Although to be fair, that story is a year old.

Well, hell. I guess they better fire the local paper's journalist that I got that number from (less than 2 months ago). Assuming anyone ever finds out for sure how much it *does* weigh LOL.

Reply to
fred

z wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@z14g2000yqa.googlegroups.com:

I don't think that it's that complicated. I think as I alluded to that it's just the weight of normal Corvette.

Reply to
fred

I would think auto factories (some of them anyway) have weigh scales built into the floor or outside somewhere so they can check the weight of whichever vehicles they manufacture.But, what do I know? cuhulin

Reply to
cuhulin

snipped-for-privacy@webtv.net wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@storefull-3171.bay.webtv.net:

Ah, but would they bother to find out the information for journalists who can't be bothered to on their own?

Reply to
fred

Problem is that the weight depends on the option packages you get. Also, the standard approximated weight includes a standard driver as well, and these days drivers are getting bigger and bigger....

--scott

Reply to
Scott Dorsey

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