MetaFilter posts tagged with car and safety

Collision Tests: Old versus New, rounds 1 and 2

filthy light thief — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 10:46:05 -0800

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety recently had their 50th anniversary, and to taut the progress of car safety design, they've set a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air versus a 2009 Chevrolet Malibu, and shared the crash test videos on YouTube. Spoiler: the dummy in the Malibu suffered only minor leg damage while the dummy in the Bel Air suffered damages that would have killed a person instantly. A few years ago, a similar test was run between two editions of Renault Espace as part of an episode of the UK series Fifth Gear. The result was similar, except there were only nine years between models (higher quality clip of the crash segment). In the segment, crash engineering research chief, Richard Morris, noted that if the older Espace hit a similarly constructed model, the damage would have been less drastic, and the driver may have survived.

cars and trucks incompatible. also, airplane crash tests, whee!

sergeant sandwich — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 21:20:24 -0800

"We tacitly agree to accept a certain level of carnage in order to use the highways in ways we value." [pdf, 750kB] Three particle physicists analyze data from crash tests and crash statistics, and show that pickup trucks pose a much greater risk to other drivers than any other type of vehicle, even SUVs. [pdf, 880kB] Also, I found some totally rad videos of airplane crash tests from nasa. Sweet!!

Hang up and drive

carter — Tue, 12 Jul 2005 09:56:32 -0800

The use of a mobile phone up to 10 minutes before a crash is associated with a fourfold increased likelihood of crashing according to a forthcoming article in the British Medical Journal. There is no safety advantage in 'hands-free' devices. The authors interviewed 456 drivers in hospital ERs in Perth, and then accessed, with consent, their phone records. The authors had wanted to carry out the study in the United States, but the phone companies would not release customer billing records, even with a customer's consent. [Article pdf free for the next few days, but BMJ will charge for it after next week I think.]

At Ford, Why Wasn't Safety

fold_and_mutilate — Tue, 11 Mar 2003 11:30:21 -0800

At Ford, Why Wasn't Safety Job One? "Like other car companies, Ford has consistently fought mandatory increases in fuel economy....by invoking fears that higher mileage requirements would result in smaller, more dangerous vehicles. Safety has been used to beat back fuel efficiency regulations. But Ford's own internal documents and a series of recent court cases reveal a company that is shockingly indifferent to safety risks in the very class of gas-guzzling vehicles it most wants to shield from increases in fuel economy standards...All of this leads us to wonder, if Ford is willing to produce a product it knows will injure and perhaps kill a certain percentage of customers simply to maintain profit margins, does the company really have driver safety at heart when its lobbyists aggressively fight easily-achievable standards for higher corporate average fuel economy?" A new review of internal car manufacturer documents, and more questions about corporate ethics.

daver — Mon, 19 Mar 2001 17:25:57 -0800

Right before you hit you were doing... Looks like we're all getting black boxes in our cars. As a high speed crash survivor I have to admit a certain curiosity as to the forces involved my accident happened. But I'm not sure I want to know this badly...