smart crash

[STEVE-O]

 

I dont know about you but i dont car how well my car would hold up in a crash if I did hold up at all. Doesnt make sence to me that they talk about how well the car withstands the impact if the driver and passengers dont survive

[2highpsi]

Why wouldnt they have performed the test with the concrete wall straight, instead of at an angle. The way they had it set up a lot of the energy was allowed to transfer laterally, somewhat reducing the impact.

[Conesmasher]

Why wouldnt they have performed the test with the concrete wall straight, instead of at an angle. The way they had it set up a lot of the energy was allowed to transfer laterally, somewhat reducing the impact.

 

I see where your coming from. My thoughts are this.....crashing the car at that corner actually puts the same energy on a "smaller" section of the car. I think with a head-on collision, the damage would be less.

[TTQ B4U]

I haven't watched this on a PC with sound, so I can't hear it, but IMO, if you're driving that thing. In those crashes, it looks like you're going to be in a wheel chair if you even have legs left. Cool concept, if everyone drove one, but with my luck, I'd get hit by some SUV or a truck and be dead.

[ImUrOBGYN]

Why wouldnt they have performed the test with the concrete wall straight, instead of at an angle. The way they had it set up a lot of the energy was allowed to transfer laterally, somewhat reducing the impact.

 

Here ya go. Figured this could explain it better than I.

 

Link:

http://www.iihs.org/ratings/frontal_test_info.html

 

Excerpt:

"Full-width and offset tests complement each other. Crashing the full width of a vehicle into a rigid barrier maximizes energy absorption so that the integrity of the occupant compartment, or safety cage, can be maintained well in all but very high-speed crashes. Full-width rigid-barrier tests produce high occupant compartment decelerations, so they're especially demanding of restraint systems. In offset tests, only one side of a vehicle's front end, not the full width, hits the barrier so that a smaller area of the structure must manage the crash energy. This means the front end on the struck side crushes more than in a full-width test, and intrusion into the occupant compartment is more likely. The bottom line is that full-width tests are especially demanding of restraints but less demanding of structure, while the reverse is true in offsets."