Size and weight of vehicles Play Major Role in Crash Safety

 

Friday, Apr 17,2009, 8:55:44 PM   Click:

Recent tests confirm that the official size and weight influence the likelihood of injury in all types of automobile accidents, and the results of tests in May using insurance risk management. Three face-to-face crash tests of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, each involving a mini Microcar or average size in a model of the same manufacturer, to show how extra vehicle size and weight to strengthen the protection of occupants in a collision.


The tests focus on the physics of car accidents, which implies that small cars can not protect people in crashes and the larger, heavier models. In a collision between two vehicles that differ in size and weight, people in smaller, lighter vehicle will be a disadvantage. The larger, heavier vehicle, press the smaller, lighter one hour back at impact. This means there will be less force on the occupants of the heavy vehicle and most people in the vehicle lighter. Greater strength is more likely, so the risk of injury goes back to the smaller, lighter vehicle.


"There are good reasons to buy mini people," said Adrian Lund, president of the Institute. "They are more affordable, and they use less gas. But security compromises are evident from our new tests. From Similarly, the implications are clear when it comes to fuel economy. If the car to reduce their fleets to use less fuel, occupant safety will be compromised. But there are ways to better serve fuel economy and safety

Although the physics of car frontal crashes are generally described in terms of what happens to vehicles, injuries are the forces acting on the occupants, and these forces are affected by two main factors. One is the weight of a vehicle crash, which determines how many will change their speed at impact. The biggest change, the more forces on the people inside and the greater the risk of injury. The second factor is the size of the car, especially the distance between the front of a vehicle's passenger compartment. The more, the lower forces on the occupants.


"Although much safer than they were several years ago as a small group to do a comparatively poor job protecting people in crashes simply because they are small and light," says Lund. "In collisions with larger vehicles, the forces acting on the smaller are the highest, and there is less distance in front of a small car in the cockpit of" descent "of the impact. These and other factors, increase the likelihood of injury. "