Do we really need all that safety stuff?

[Arragonis]

Originally Posted by jcp123

Well, I think the point is a very libertarian one. The idea is that nobody should tell us that we HAVE to have this equipment, and nobody should tell you that you HAVE to be without it.

This is confusing libertarianism with irresponsibility, and a few other ideas IMHO.

But enjoy if you must.

[IamIan]

Originally Posted by ksa8907

Well id like to see the data. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that 3,333 is 1/3 of 10,000. My guess? they took 3 data points and made a generalization.

Show me the study or the data, then we'll talk.

Data used in reference , citation to it's source , and the logical steps taken ... already posted previously .. go back and re-read post #33

And yes , it is a generalization .. AFAIK it isn't possible to talk about vehicle 'safety' and not generalize ... Air bags under some situations are the cause of injury (not prevent it) .. Same with seat belts ... etc .. etc.

If you don't generalize ... you than are only left with one answer ... = .. "It depends on the situation" ... Any 'safety' feature may itself cause a hazard in some cherry picked specific situation .. so , instead , we generalize... so we can say things like .. 'generally' air bags reduce hazards more than they cause them ... 'generally' seat belts reduce hazards more than they cause them ... etc.

So ... now let's talk... Lighter vehicle is itself a safety feature .. if you care about safety of yourself and others .. make sure to include it in your list of things to consider the next time you consider buying a vehicle.

- - - -

Speaking of safety and PoV on Statistics ... for fun ... next time you have to travel .. keep in mind ... Air travel is just under 3x more dangerous 'per trip' , than driving a car ... and about 27x more dangerous than taking a bus 'per trip' ... Link ... The air lines love to 'push' the PoV of 'per mile' ... because it makes them look good ... and they really try to avoid discussion of their horribly low safety rating 'per trip'... because it makes them look bad ... but if you have a choice .. flying is not 'automatically' the safer option (statistically) ... odds are taking a bus is safer in more cases (but not always)... love safety for yourself and your loved ones = 'take a bus'.

[darcane]

Originally Posted by RedDevil

Fine if you make your own decisions, but what about the safety of others?

You may be allowed to buy a car without personal safety equipment, but not to sell it, nor take passengers - especially underage ones.

Then, once your health insurence learns what you drive your rates may rise quite some.

Unsafe cars may get a safety warning just like tobacco has, maybe with some nice pictures to boot.

I can go buy a car right now with no airbags, 3-point belts, crash bars, ABS, traction control, etc and legally drive it, even with minors in the car. Health insurance rates won't be affected. I can turn around and sell it too.

The car will be 50 years old, but still perfectly legal.

On the other hand, import cars that don't meet the safety standards and they will be seized (and probably crushed) by the Federal Government.:
the-feds-just-seized-40-land-rovers-imported-to-the-u-s

It's a crazy place we live in.

[redpoint5]

Good discussion. Freedom is a double-edged sword. It allows for the opportunity to thrive, and allows for the opportunity to fail. To what extent is the community responsible for the individuals well-being?

My cousin is an idiot with money and would be much better off if I managed his finances, but I'm not sure he would be happier. It might be that ignorance is bliss.

[freebeard]

Wow, 9 pages in three days. Thanks IamIan for the charts and link. Buses are safer than trains. Who knew?

On equipment: tires, brakes and suspension, AWD, ABS. Organizations like NASCAR, SCTA and NHRA have a lot of experience with keeping hell-bent drivers alive. At Bonneville they won't let you drive in a cross-wind.

On weight: I really wish I'd had camera when I saw the SUV resting on the front of it's hood and windshield header in the middle of an intersection. I think it has a bit to do with the center of gravity.

On the nut behind the wheel. Citation needed, but in some percentage of accidents the driver never touched the brakes. Here's this:
6 Ways to Drive Tactically (Technical Driving) - wikiHow

[niky]

Originally Posted by bschloop

That's not exactly true. I see "Smart" cars, and 1st gen insights on an almost daily basis, and my wife bought a Mirage, and brags about it to everyone she knows. Truth be told, more people die in accidents while driving SUV's than cars. They sit too high, and flip too easily. Nothing, I repeat NOTHING, short of a nascar style head restraint system, will keep you safe in a rollover.

That being said, I am of the opinion that vehicles over 4000lb curb weight ought to be classified as a "light commercial vehicle" and require a special license. That would have a greater effect on highway safety than any equipment you could put in a vehicle.

While I agree with you... sadly... sales statistics point to the sobering... or depressing... trend of people voting for bigger and bigger cars with their wallets. Every time gas prices dip back after a fluctuation, truck sales increase and small car sales decrease.

-

Still, nice to see people are actually buying the Mirage over there!

Originally Posted by 2000mc

theres this Death rates fall as vehicles improve
but at the end of the page, i see the Ford Crown Victoria, appears in the LOWEST rates of driver deaths chart.
meanwhile i see the Mercury Grand Marquis, making an appearance in the HIGHEST rates of driver deaths chart.

Recent statistics show the same... midsized cars are safest, pick-ups and small cars among the unsafest... but these stats, like the latest IIHS numbers, are hugely skewed by buyer demographics, otherwise, the big, heavy Camaro, with its acres of crush space in front and big heavy V8 to absorb killing forces, wouldn't be one of the deadliest vehicles on the road. This also explains the difference between the Crown Vic and the Grand Marquis.

-

Also doesn't help whenever an agency decides: Hey, let's crash an Accord into a Fit to show people that, when subject to the same crash forces, a Fit is less safe.

Of course, you don't need to be a rocket scientist to see what's wrong with that one... you're showing a 90 pound weakling can't take a punch from a heavyweight boxer, whereas a heavyweight boxer can take a punch from a 90 pound weakling. Completely absent is the part where they ram both against an elephant... errh... eighteen wheeler... because... like... nobody wants to learn that their big car offers nearly as little protection from an eighteen wheeler as a five star small car, right? Not like we don't know that already from actual, scientific crash tests...

What we should learn from such publicity stunts is that we should all ask to be jabbed in the face by ninety pound weaklings rather than bull rhinoceroses.

[ksa8907]

Originally Posted by IamIan

Data used in reference , citation to it's source , and the logical steps taken ... already posted previously .. go back and re-read post #33

And yes , it is a generalization .. AFAIK it isn't possible to talk about vehicle 'safety' and not generalize ... Air bags under some situations are the cause of injury (not prevent it) .. Same with seat belts ... etc .. etc.

If you don't generalize ... you than are only left with one answer ... = .. "It depends on the situation" ... Any 'safety' feature may itself cause a hazard in some cherry picked specific situation .. so , instead , we generalize... so we can say things like .. 'generally' air bags reduce hazards more than they cause them ... 'generally' seat belts reduce hazards more than they cause them ... etc.

So ... now let's talk... Lighter vehicle is itself a safety feature .. if you care about safety of yourself and others .. make sure to include it in your list of things to consider the next time you consider buying a vehicle.

- - - -

Speaking of safety and PoV on Statistics ... for fun ... next time you have to travel .. keep in mind ... Air travel is just under 3x more dangerous 'per trip' , than driving a car ... and about 27x more dangerous than taking a bus 'per trip' ... Link ... The air lines love to 'push' the PoV of 'per mile' ... because it makes them look good ... and they really try to avoid discussion of their horribly low safety rating 'per trip'... because it makes them look bad ... but if you have a choice .. flying is not 'automatically' the safer option (statistically) ... odds are taking a bus is safer in more cases (but not always)... love safety for yourself and your loved ones = 'take a bus'.

To start things off I should point out, the references you made to the IIHS presentation is good. But its a presentation not a technical paper, so we don't know if those "per 1 million registered vehicles" is one million vehicles distributed among the different types, or 1 million of each type.

If you still believe you are correct, please show me REAL DATA from a PEER REVIEWED STUDY/TECHNICAL PAPER.

Also, taken directly from the summary of the presentation: "• Smaller and lighter vehicles will always have some disadvantage"
I really don't know how to chalk that one up in favor of smaller and lighter vehicles.

As far as our disagreeing, I'll drive my larger and heavier vehicle and you can drive your smaller and lighter vehicle. For your sake, I hope we never wind up in an accident together.

[ksa8907]

Originally Posted by niky

Also doesn't help whenever an agency decides: Hey, let's crash an Accord into a Fit to show people that, when subject to the same crash forces, a Fit is less safe.

Of course, you don't need to be a rocket scientist to see what's wrong with that one... you're showing a 90 pound weakling can't take a punch from a heavyweight boxer, whereas a heavyweight boxer can take a punch from a 90 pound weakling. Completely absent is the part where they ram both against an elephant... errh... eighteen wheeler... because... like... nobody wants to learn that their big car offers nearly as little protection from an eighteen wheeler as a five star small car, right? Not like we don't know that already from actual, scientific crash tests...

These are real world results though, how often is someone going to wreck their car at 45mph at an exact location on the vehicle with no outside variables being involved and into a fixed object.

Obviously a lot of "tests" are really marketing schemes, but either way these are the accidents that are happening every day. Some asshole running a red light and creaming a minivan with a family of 4 inside.

[niky]

Originally Posted by ksa8907

These are real world results though, how often is someone going to wreck their car at 45mph at an exact location on the vehicle with no outside variables being involved and into a fixed object.

Obviously a lot of "tests" are really marketing schemes, but either way these are the accidents that are happening every day. Some asshole running a red light and creaming a minivan with a family of 4 inside.

I wasn't talking specifically about a small overlap versus a big overlap test... but a weighted test crashing two vehicles together.

The point is, crashing a car against an immovable barrier is the worst case scenario for that particular closing speed.

Crashing a car against another car, as the IIHS did, will give you a different result... depending on what the "other" car is. I find it rather funny when a safety advocate crashes two non-identical cars together and declares one safer because it received less damage. Duh. Physics dictates that the larger car transfers greater force to whatever it hits... which is why the other car receives more damage.

What they didn't demonstrate is what happens when you crash that larger car against another large car, to show whether that large car can withstand being hit with the same amount of force that the smaller car was subjected to.

Never thought much of that "crash test" before, until I realized how they were padding those numbers, intentionally or not.

TL;DR: Take what the IIHS dishes out with a grain of salt. Their small overlap test is a actually a very good idea, an indicator of what might actually happen in a car-to-car crash in situations not covered by standard head-on and modest overlap tests... and forces manufacturers to further develop crash safety than to design cars specifically to pass tests. But their release of statistics and stunts like the car-to-car test come with a lot of caveats.

-

Also: RE: Marketing exercises... NCAP. While homogenizing crash safety requirements between regions via NCAP is a good idea, there's a lot of politics and strong-arming happening behind the scenes as NCAP pushes its business model (and yes, it's a business) onto developing markets.

[Cd]

Originally Posted by 2000mc

$5 Amazon.com: Custom Accessories 71121 2" Blind Spot Mirror, (Twin Pack): Automotive


or $150 Amazon.com : Myron & Davis BSM100 Dual Sensor Blind Spot Monitor System : Automotive

i wouldnt think the ultrasonic sensors would work so well at speed, but then i can hear my tire noise more when i drive past something. gm oe systems use actual radar though

I think I'm going to buy this and install it on my car. Thanks again for the link.

I had second thoughts though when I noted that the shipping weight was 2.6 lbs !!!
How will I ever make up the mileage lost to those extra 2 .6 lbs ????