Quote:
Originally Posted by racprops
driving a strong car can help in most of the accidents you most like to be involved in.
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This whole "strong car" thing is fallacious. The reason modern cars have crumple zones is twofold: one, the kinetic energy of the car when it hits something is used to deform the car itself, which reduces the energy that can be transferred to the passengers; two, by extending the time from initial impact to when the vehicle stops moving toward whatever it hit, the acceleration (change in velocity per time) is reduced. Since force is the product of mass and acceleration, reducing acceleration reduces the overall force that can act on the occupants. Airbags work on the same principle, extending the time it takes for a passenger's head and torso to go from initial velocity to zero velocity and thus reducing the total force acting on them.
The last thing you want if you're interested in passenger safety is a car that
doesn't deform; in that situation there is far more energy transferred to and force acting on the vehicle occupants, who are less replaceable than a car. That's why literally
no one builds cars like that any more and one reason why passenger vehicle deaths are down significantly from where they were in the 1970s (11.2 deaths per 100,000 people in 2018 vs. 22.6 deaths per 100,000 people in 1978, per the IIHS).