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View Poll Results: Compact or Crossover for Saftey?
Would stick to compact and drive safe 40 78.43%
Crossover for Saftey 0 0%
Would get a crossover if it had the same mpg 7 13.73%
Would pay up for saftey and get a larger car 4 7.84%
Voters: 51. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 02-15-2012, 05:14 AM   #41 (permalink)
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2x the death rate of infinitesimally small is still infinitesimally small.

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Old 02-15-2012, 08:02 AM   #42 (permalink)
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Icy roads are one place where lightweight vehicles really shine. If you get into a skid, it is much easier to recover from the skid in a lightweight car than in a heavier vehicle, whose greater inertia makes skid recovery techniques much trickier to manage. Then if the skidding vehicle is a SUV with a high center of gravity, when it reaches the end of the icy patch or the edge of the road while still sliding sideways, then you will likely have a rollover event.

When driving my 2000 lbs car, its a piece of cake to initiate and recover from skids, but when trying the same thing in my 4000 lbs SUV, its very difficult to keep from overcompensating when trying to straighten out the vehicle as it is skidding.
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Old 02-15-2012, 08:49 AM   #43 (permalink)
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I think the large & heavy = safer for your family arguement was thought up in the marketing department of an American automobile manufacturer possibly when the first gas crunch happened in the 1970's. They were caught in a horsepower race and had few and poor choices for cars that got good fuel economy. They tried to make it sound like if you drive a small car you are risking your life.

I watched a NHTSA video of a 1959 BelAir crash test and a 2009 Malibu crash test. The person in the Malibu would have gotten out and felt sorry for the loss of the vehicle and then praised God they walked away. The family of the driver of the BelAir would have had a closed casket funeral.

ALL of the cars today crash more safely than those in the past. Ignore the marketing departments who are trying to get you into the most expensive car you can afford and buy enough car to make you happy. When my kids were small, we fit two kids, diaper bag, stroller and small ice chest into the '84 Cavalier we had and went anywhere we wanted to go. Those who felt the need to load all that {and often lots more} into a Dodge Caravan simply paid a hihger penalty to get from here to there.
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Old 02-15-2012, 10:11 AM   #44 (permalink)
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No one's going to try to deny that, on like-for-like cars, having more safety features will add more weight, are they?
A 1959 BelAir and a 2009 Malibu have fifty years of safety technology (and maybe more important around two decades of realising safety really can sell cars!) between them that's primarily why one is so much safer than the other.

The opposite situation is shown with the Golf GTI - When it was launched was very light and had a comparatively small (1500cc-?) engine. Twenty years later it has become fat having doubled in weight. Some of this is bells and whistles, but the modern car is a lot more metal.
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Old 02-15-2012, 11:04 AM   #45 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Frank Lee View Post
2x the death rate of infinitesimally small is still infinitesimally small.
Unfortunately, the chances to die in a motoring accident have become relatively small, but not infinitesimally small.

And large population numbers, make for a lot of people and families being involved.
On top of that, it's a recurring annual chance.
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Old 02-15-2012, 11:11 AM   #46 (permalink)
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No one's going to try to deny that, on like-for-like cars, having more safety features will add more weight, are they?
They'll add some weight, but not nearly the weight that was added for all sorts of creature comforts.

The increase in volume has a big influence on weight - so much that it becomes a significant weight saving to replace the metal outer shell, some internal components and glass with reinforced plastics.
On the fat modern Golf, this can save up to 370 kg - more than 1/4th of its empty weight - while the structure remains untouched.
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Old 02-15-2012, 11:51 AM   #47 (permalink)
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I find this thread very interesting, so I'm going to play devils advocate for a minute:

There are two ends to the spectrum: Large vehicles where occupants are safer when a multi-car collision occurs, however due to poor maneuverability are less likely to be able to avoid such an accident, and small vehicles where occupants are less safe when a multi-car collision occurs, however due to size and maneuverability are more likely to be able to avoid an accident.

It seems that many are arguing the smaller vehicles are safer overall due to size and maneuverability. My question is, would you argue that doing anything to increase handling/braking abilities worth it? Stickier tires could increase your grip by probably up to .2Gs over your LRR tires. Hell, proper tire pressure could offer benefits here as well. Better brake pads too (which have no fuel economy downside).

I guess my point is that half of you guys arguing that the small car is lighter and more maneuverable have also modified your car in a way that decreases its handling and braking performance (LRR tires, high tire pressure, etc.) thus making it less safe. Where do you draw the line?
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Old 02-15-2012, 11:57 AM   #48 (permalink)
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Maneuvering out of situations thus avoiding an accident would require some situational awareness. Uhmericans would be screwed.
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Old 02-15-2012, 12:15 PM   #49 (permalink)
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Quote:
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Maneuvering out of situations thus avoiding an accident would require some situational awareness. Uhmericans would be screwed.
When they teach you to stay in your lane and just brake in lieu of trying to avoid contact, then you get screwed twice.
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Old 02-15-2012, 12:30 PM   #50 (permalink)
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Quote:
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well according to this, which is based on deaths per vehicle registered ( which would nullify any arguments that smaller cars have an advantage of avoiding an accident )

http://www.nhtsa.gov/staticfiles/rul...kshop-Lund.pdf
You have, however, completely missed a very important point. Notice that what's being shown in all those graphs are DRIVER DEATHS, when we should instead be looking at TOTAL DEATHS. The Wenzel & Ross paper does just this, and comes to an entirely different set of conclusions.

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