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US safety body keen to revise crash test program

By David Zalstein |
FIND DEALS

The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is keen to revise its American five-star crash safety scheme with new tests including a small overlap and an oblique crash test.

NHTSA administrator David Strickland has told industry journal Automotive News that the administration’s researchers are currently studying the small overlap crash test, which would make achieving a five-star safety rating more difficult for car makers.

“We are working right now on an offset or oblique test. I know that the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) has a small overlap test, which is very similar,” Strickland said.

“We believe that we are going to promulgate a test which is going to replicate those small overlap crashes in a realistic way.”

The small overlap crash test sees the corner of a car’s front bumper impact an object, while the oblique crash collides a vehicle with an object at an angle.

Strickland said it would be some time before the tests were put in place, but insisted “we’re very close on the research phase to actually get that compliance test done”.

2012 Mercedes C class small overlap test

 

In the IIHS test (video above), 25 per cent of a car’s front end on the driver side makes contact with a five-foot-tall rigid barrier at 64km/h. Locally, the Australasian New Car Assessment Program’s (ANCAP) crash tests include a side impact, pedestrian, pole, and frontal offset test – the latter seeing 40 per cent of a car’s front end on the driver’s side make contact with a crushable aluminium barrier at 64km/h.


 

  • Peter

    hmmm, we were talking about that under the ANCAP story above.  c class and A4 perform poorly in the small offset tests, Lexus has 10 times more passenger compartment intrusion than a Volvo V60, 3 series doesn’t perform too well either.  It’s scary stuff.

    • O123

      Because all carmakers do is engineer the cars to get 5 stars in the tests that ANCAP, ENCAP do. Volvo is one of the few makers that go above and beyond to make their cars safe.

  • Zaccy16

    i think these organisations should make it harder and harder for car companies to get a 5 star rating so they have to keep improving their safety systems

    • Charlie

      Yes, but then comes the problem of adjusting ratings of existing and superseded models.

  • Andrew

    Would be interested to see how Commodore and Falcon performs under these tests. Camry failed miserably.

  • Asdfasdf

    If they include the small overlap crash test, the Camry (and Aurion) will get 1 out of 5 star for safety.

    • Peter

      so they will have that in common with Lexus as well

    • Asdf

      Yeah, along with the C-Class and A4. Looks like we’ll be seeing a lot of 1 star cars in the future, lol.

  • Zaccy16

    Does that mean that the proton jumbuck will get a minus star rating!

    • Asdf

      Lol, I think zero stars would be harsh enough.

  • Abcdefg

    The Honda Accord, Acura TSX (Accord Euro) and other cars passed the small overlap crash test with flying colours. Just search Youtube.

    • Asdf

      I was aware of that. :)

      • Asdf

        And good for them. :)