Smash!

July 31, 2007 9:16 AM

Crash tests. Exactly what it sounds like. Double-Link-YouTube-Filter.
posted by dersins (26 comments total)

Neat. How do they crash test an airliner, or was that a real crash?

Also, note to future youtubers: Your favorite amateur soundtrack sucks.
posted by DU at 9:23 AM on July 31, 2007

Mmmmm...giant wiener crash test.
posted by jaimev at 9:31 AM on July 31, 2007

Watching these videos together with a more ambient soundtrack such as the new Album Leaf record was a very soothing experience.

Here is a more complete video of the NASA plane crash test. Lots of dummies burning to death in that one.
posted by uandt at 9:37 AM on July 31, 2007

Out out daemon of stupidity !

That should be, including the strack, a mandatory video before getting a driver licence. Also in the back of every driving school a nice crashed car !

Yet everybody is obsessed by speed, therefore the security theater of speed limit, while I guess most of these test were done at a speed of just 50 Km/s demostrating how utterly insecure ANY car is , unless one is driving at traffic jam pace.

But hey ...why advertise the truth of mortal crashes in graphic display ? That'd reduce sales and driving, maybe ? That's the same as showing what is real effect of an ak47 round on a human body, instead of advertising how effective is for polar bear hunting in Florida.
posted by elpapacito at 9:59 AM on July 31, 2007

I don't know if 'people' crave it.
Dave Barry might say 'if you don't like this, then you're probably of the female persuasion.'
posted by MtDewd at 10:47 AM on July 31, 2007

I object to the gratuitous beaver shot at 1:08 in the first link.

wtf?
posted by chococat at 10:57 AM on July 31, 2007

DU: "Neat. How do they crash test an airliner, or was that a real crash?"

The first one they showed in the first video was the Controlled Impact Demonstration, a test of a fire-retardant additive. They didn't crash the way they wanted to (they meant to crash with the wings flat, because obviously that's how planes always crash). But it's cool!

I don't know what the second plane crash is from.
posted by Plutor at 11:01 AM on July 31, 2007

The second plane crash was a test of a Lockheed Constellation performed in 1965 by the US military. A video including a couple extra angles.
posted by Plutor at 11:24 AM on July 31, 2007

My real question was how they crashed it without hurting anyone (short answer: remote control(!)) but the story itself is kind of funny. Not only did they crash the plane wrong, the additive didn't work either. N
posted by DU at 11:37 AM on July 31, 2007

according to this article, crash tests for cars cost $300K a pop, and gm performs 600 of them a year.

ford and gm are also working on digital crash tests. (not quite as awesome as two trains crashing into each other, but still kind of cool.)

here for video (you have to sit through some ads to get to the goods).
posted by brooklynexperiment at 12:08 PM on July 31, 2007

Some of those cars simply dissolved. I drive a lot of similar older machinery.

If you reduced the mass of all of the cars on the road, everyone would be safer. But if it's heavey vs. light, heavy often carries the day.
posted by maxwelton at 12:10 PM on July 31, 2007

"But if it's heavey vs. light, heavy often carries the day"- not necessarily so.
posted by marvin at 12:31 PM on July 31, 2007

Many of the cars you see in the 2nd video that absolutly fail were from crash tests of (IIRC) a chinese car company that makes really really cheap vehicles (and it shows!).
posted by Mach5 at 12:32 PM on July 31, 2007

I doubt they were testing what happens when you run over a car with a tank, but I could be wrong.
posted by puke & cry at 12:56 PM on July 31, 2007

In most of those, the airbag seemed to be completely unnecessary. I guess the crash speeds where high. Those cars utterly crushed. I imagine I will drive more slowly for the next few days.
posted by weathermachine at 1:10 PM on July 31, 2007

I put the audio on mute and watched both videos with Sabre Dance on a loop. I would especially recommend that song for when the cars are passing by the 747.
posted by CitrusFreak12 at 1:25 PM on July 31, 2007

Marvin: The more and more suddenly you change your direction of travel, the more you die, (Brain smashing into skull, heart continuing forward and ripping itself from arteries). This is generally blamed on Newton.

Based on the videos of the Smart, and the picture you link to, I would bet the pick up came to a gentler stop, facing roughly the same way it was facing before the crash while the smart bounced all over the place.

I beleive the main advantage of the smart in a high speed crash (the smart is designed for urban use, with lower speeds), is to make it easier to recover the corpses.
posted by Dataphage at 1:26 PM on July 31, 2007

Dunno. Looking at the way the Smart rolls all over the place dissipating energy (and components) it looks like a safer bet than that truck right at the beginning.
posted by marvin at 1:43 PM on July 31, 2007

I could add that from experience rolling a Fiat Uno several times, starting at over 90mph down the M4, shedding major components, then having to crawl out of it, parked upside down on its roof, all I got was a grazed elbow (road rash from when the side windows burst) The police told me afterwards than when they towed it off the road it would only stand on three wheels.

Something to do with energy dissipation I think. (And youthful stupidity)
posted by marvin at 1:51 PM on July 31, 2007

I like how in the first video, with the line of cars that gets hit by the large truck, the first two cars disintegrate almost entirely. I want to know what the hell those are so I never get in one.
posted by invitapriore at 3:28 PM on July 31, 2007

invatapriore: The first car is a red Citroen 2CV (1948-1990) and the second is probably a Fiat 127 (1971-1983).

I think about half of the non-NCAP type footage there has come from Top Gear.
posted by twine42 at 4:05 PM on July 31, 2007

See also: Coudal's Crash Ballet Contest (which used some of the same public domain NASA video).
posted by dhartung at 5:26 PM on July 31, 2007

The little car at 3:08 is pretty friggin' impressive.
posted by delmoi at 6:50 PM on July 31, 2007

Damn, those smarts are tough motherfuckers.
posted by delmoi at 6:53 PM on July 31, 2007

People don't grok high-energy collisions. Look at the whole 9/11 collapse theory debacle, the way things behave when squllions of tons of mass is moving at speed is totally different from our everyday life. You know how trucks are the big men on campus? Yeah, compared to a freight train they're candy. But go ahead, run that crossing, you'll totally beat the train.
posted by Skorgu at 10:37 PM on July 31, 2007

So if my wife ever sees these, my Volkswagen van dreams are pretty much fucked.
posted by M.C. Lo-Carb! at 8:12 AM on August 1, 2007