Can We Really Trust Vehicle Safety Ratings?

Every 16 minutes someone dies in a car accident.

This number is the lowest in the recent years, but it’s still terrifying and chilling.

That is why automotive industry, supported by government, use every method available to them to save drivers and their passengers. They test everything, just so that you can survive that drunk driver and see another day.

We are talking about test vehicles, test crash dummies and… Cadavers? ‘That can’t be right’ you might say, but explanation is simple, albeit a little bit disgusting, so continue reading to find out more about it.

Concept cars that never get the chance to feel street roads

Not so long ago we talked about amazing concept vehicles that never got to mass production and assembly lines.

It’s true, we complained like little brats, fascinated by how some of them looked. ‘Looked’, that’s the keyword here.

We didn’t even had the wildest idea about anything else. We never thought how would that particular vehicle behave on the road! Similarly to that famous glorifying line that points out that ‘what’s inside really counts’, the same can be said about vehicles, too. Even though the design looks impressive, sometimes, what some artist drew in his studio far away from safety testing facilities is even further away from actually being safe.

That’s when a lot of these projects get scrapped and thrown away.

Now, don’t be fooled though. Automotive industry didn’t grow conscience all of a sudden, they  were forced by government to do such tests. It is, however, true that some things they test themselves in order to improve characteristics of the vehicle. Only when their newest model is safe for driving and it offers acceptable reliability – they can go to the mass production.

Except for those crash dummies, and those terrifying crash videos, most people know very little about the whole process, so that’s where we step in with our this week’s article.

What exactly are those crash ratings?

By following our articles on how to improve safety of your truck or your driving you minimized the risks and did whatever you could to protect yourself. But something bad can still happen and that’s when it really counts what crash rating does your vehicle have. But who is responsible for those ratings?

In the United States of America, there are two important organisations: NHTSA and IIHS.

NHTSA or National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, is federal government body in charge of controlling safety. They look into every single detail of a car, some of which we didn’t even know are important, while other are more obvious – like seat belts quality, dashboard padding, etc.

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration uses ‘star’ system that you probably noticed in various reviews, rating frontal and side collision and rollover. Difference between one and maximum, five stars, is significant, because top rating guarantees 30% less chance of serious injuries or even a fatal outcome of a crash.

Insurance Institute for Highway Safety or IIHS is non-government, non-profit organisation entirely in the hands of several big car insurance companies. Their marks are simply set as Good, Acceptable, Marginal and Poor. IIHS has some different procedures and tests, compared to NHTSA, but their studies are conducted seriously and results are considered equally important.

Interesting thing about IIHS is that they are not only releasing to the general public results of crash tests – on their website you can also see complete videos of many such tests. You can  search through IIHS database for model of your vehicle and see how well it survived chilling encounter with huge sturdy block. Videos are showing impact in normal speed, then slow-motion and even close-up of the dummy. But beware, watching these mechanical beauties destroyed in this manner might be hard for some people.

By torturing poor rag-dolls, both NHTSA and IIHS are able to learn many important things, more often than not, at the same time forcing big companies into redesigning analyzed cars, vans, SUVs or trucks. The weird thing is, crash test dummies are not the only ones making sure future drivers are safe.

People are testing vehicles, too!

Just don’t call them dummies.

It is true that safety is improved by real, living drivers, but not in the way you might expect. No one would really want to sit in car rushing towards wall. Well, except for those high paying stunt drivers, but that’s the story for another occasion.

Instead, automakers often look for interested drivers that would take  brand new vehicle on open road and test how it behaves in  ”real” driving conditions.

This is done because simulation and professional drivers  can’t really tell if some regular Joe or Jane will have difficulties driving new model.

After extensive tests on closed track and with the help of pros, regular folks like us finally get a chance to sit behind steering wheel and determine how good it really is. Companies are actually looking to see how will people react to some radical and innovative changes they implemented in, for example, new generation of their well known model.

That might be new automatic transmission, handling system, but nowadays a lot of tests are tied to electric and hybrid cars since almost every model is trying to implement some brand new technologies that might take a lot of time to get used to.

The Nissan Leaf is the freshest example. Nissan recruited a big number of people that were tasked to test how many miles can the car travel before its battery runs completely dry. They also wanted to see how people react to driving  green car and what difficulties that option might present them.

This kind of tests are usually done with large group of drivers, having in mind diversity among them, which is important in getting the best possible picture on how will real customers accept the new product. Of course, because of the extent of this kind of research, this method is really expensive, but that’s just a smart investment in product, that could pay really well in the future.

Dead people are testing vehicles, too!

Again, yes, dead, you read it well.

This is one of the less known facts about safety tests, but real human bodies, cadavers, are used for crash tests. Truth to be told, it is not popular like it was back in the day, but some companies are still recruiting the dead to help the living.

Even though dummies can show impacts, and some modified versions of a regular rag-dolls can give more detailed information about damages to the human body, only cadavers can show real effects of the collision.

During the crash, experts can see realistic body movement, which isn’t entirely possible with crash test dummies, and after it, they can analyze how collision is reflected to internal organs.

This method is obviously not so practical, but more importantly, it is just plain awful, so it is only natural that car manufacturers turned towards modern technology and computer simulation programs that almost entirely let the dead rest in peace.

Green vehicles = danger!

As much as we like diesel engines and ruthless power of our truck, gas prices are going only higher. Going green is no longer philosophy of those who are, of course very understandably, protective of our environment.

But electric vehicles bring new problems. They are, literally, deadly silent.

Many people complained when they realized how quiet are electric motors even when under full throttle. This is troublesome, because many pedestrians might get hurt simple because they might not hear car approaching. For this reason engineers are working on developing artificial sounds those car could produce.

Having liberty to add any sound they could wish for, they decided to go and choose the one that would be the most noticeable in the streets. Not only that, but the chosen sound must be appropriate for selected vehicle.

Being not the smallest and simplest task on their hands, they organized testing for general public to determine which one should be put into their vehicles. This way they increase chances that the sound that is emitted artificially is really the one that could make people stop and turn around, eliminating hazards and even deaths.

In conclusion, can we really trust safety ratings? Yes and no.

Yes, they really are important part of the vehicle production and they significantly lower chances of nasty accidents and fatalities. No matter how safe a vehicle is, however, danger isn’t completely removed. To further minimize it, you should follow one of the previously published articles on our blog and stick to them.

Like one famous poet said: “It’s your life, it’s now or never”.