2 ms·
Deformation of the front of the car is exactly what you want. Ideally everything in front of your feet should be crushed like crazy. But what you see in the Bri
by hugh3 17y ago
Deformation of the front of the car is exactly what you want. Ideally everything in front of your feet should be crushed like crazy. But what you see in the Brilliance and the F-150 is that the passenger compartment itself starts deforming, increasing the chances that you're going to wind up with a jagged piece of door metal in your skull, or crushed between the roof and the floor. Nasty.
After viewing the F-150 video I was tempted to say that standards must be different for trucks -- they're built differently and have a helluva lot more momentum to dissipate coming from the back. But then I looked at crash tests for the Chevy Silverado and Nissan Titan, and it looks like that F-150 is just a piece of junk because those other two hold up a lot better.
- Elepsis 17y agoLet's keep in mind that we're comparing a 2001 car with much more recent ones. Here's a video of the 2008 F-150, where it holds up dramatically better. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LkAzt_0qIg&NR=1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LkAzt_0qIg&NR=1 Progress is awesome.
- jacquesm 17y agoYes, that is quite a difference, it's like it's a completely new design from a passenger protection point of view.
- logarithmic 17y agoIndeed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWaLPqrZI1E http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWaLPqrZI1E
- hugh3 17y agoFound in a related video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ReZ0C_UF-8&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ReZ0C_UF-8&feature=relat... This is why an F-150 is still a pretty good place to be in a real-world accident where you're more likely to hit another car rather than a thick concrete wall. Conservation of momentum says that when a big heavy thing meets a much smaller thing the big heavy thing comes off looking much better.
- harpastum 17y agoThat's actually not exactly what's happening. The force on each of the cars is identical, but the major difference I see is that the F150 is actually much taller than the escort. The grill/engine of the truck hit the car above its center of gravity. All of the impact energy went into the truck's engine block, but into the passenger pillar in the car. That's why the car came off looking so much worse.