6 ms·
This is simply unkind to the competition (and to the poles alike): "Tesla achieved this outcome by nesting multiple deep aluminum extrusions in the side rail of
by RomP 13y ago
This is simply unkind to the competition (and to the poles alike): "Tesla achieved this outcome by nesting multiple deep aluminum extrusions in the side rail of the car that absorb the impact energy (a similar approach was used by the Apollo Lunar Lander) and transfer load to the rest of the vehicle. This causes the pole to be either sheared off or to stop the car before the pole hits an occupant."
There's winning and there's crushing the opponents. One shouldn't gloat in the latter case, but this case deserves an exception.
Congratulations Elon and the team on tremendously nice engineering!
- Florin_Andrei 13y ago> There's winning and there's crushing the opponents. Crushing the opponents while your car remains uncrushed in the test (or the least crushed). That's what you get when you ask the rocket scientist to make you a car.
- ISL 13y agoIf you ask a rocket scientist to make you a car that passes the crash test ratings alone, they'll build you a tungsten dump truck. If you're going to win, you might as well reach the destination without noticing that you've had a collision.
- mikeash 13y agoI imagine NASA's crawler transporters would score exceedingly well on most of these tests, assuming the technicians survived.
- notaddicted 13y agoI believe one of the tests is crashing into a wall that yields very little, so the tungsten dumptruck would fare poorly, exciting as it would be to drive. EDIT: this one: http://youtu.be/V5R80yUUVNk http://youtu.be/V5R80yUUVNk
- ISL 13y agoThe wall at left in that video is, at most, four dump trucks in volume and perhaps constructed of reinforced concrete (density ~2,500 kg/m^3)? A single solid tungsten dump truck would have almost twice the mass of the wall. Even with a completely inelastic collision, the wall's going to shatter and move. For a 35 mph collision, I think you're right, that wall would ultimately bring the truck to a halt from friction with the ground. At higher speeds, I think the truck might make it through. Tungsten is quite dense (19,300 kg/m^3). Such a truck would have a mass of >400 metric tons (2 x 3 x 4 m x 19 tons/m^3), or >247 Toyota Tacomas (2013 extended cab, curb weight 3560 lb --> 1618 kg). The truck would be terrifying to drive, once you got it going. I don't know how you'd turn. Alas, Youtube is short on tungsten dumptrucks, but this may suffice. In a demonstration, a truck uses its brakes to stop after obliterating a few cars. The truck is driven by a real person. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6TRqjjnO58 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6TRqjjnO58
- jlgreco 13y ago>400 metric tons So around the max takeoff weight of a 747, with approximately as heavy duty a wheel setup I assume. That would be quite a truck.
- Florin_Andrei 13y agoGiven a heavy enough tungsten truck...
- Someone 13y agoThe goal of a crash test is not to keep the car intact, it is to keep the driver intact. On "keep the car intact", today's cars do way more badly than those of the 1950's.
- jacquesm 13y ago> On "keep the car intact", today's cars do way more badly than those of the 1950's. I don't think that is true. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joMK1WZjP7g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joMK1WZjP7g
- tempestn 13y agoGreat video. Pretty clear that both occupant and vehicle fared worse in the 1950s. (Although after a serious collision I doubt many people care much how the car looks.)
- at-fates-hands 13y agoYou also have to factor in a lot cars in those days didn't have, and weren't required to have seat belts. This safety feature alone has saved thousands of lives regardless of how safe the car is.
- Someone 13y agoNice video, deserves my upvote, but I am going to call it just anecdata ;-), so that I can add some partial counterarguments. The video is a commercial, so they will have chosen an impact angle and speed that makes the newer car look best). For example, you can see that the newer car is heavier than the old one from the video; its front wheels still move forward when the wheels of the old one already go back. Because of that, the new car has a much longer braking distance than the old one. Things would have looked relatively better for the old car if they had chosen a collision with a concrete wall. Also, Reading http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crumple_zone http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crumple_zone, the crumple zone was patented in 1952; chances are this 1959 car doesn't have a good one. If its crumple zone is bad or absent, chances are that the older car would have survived way better in a frontal collision, where the beam carrying the engine would be elastically compressed without deforming permanently. That would be just the car, though; those old cars could be lethal at incredibly low speeds, for example by impaling them on their non-collapsible steering column.
- bobbles 13y agoIs there some kind of diagram that explains how this works? I can't really see how this works just by imagining it.
- curiousDog 13y agoNot exactly a diagram but the a video of the test: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dz2FMfv-CSc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dz2FMfv-CSc A bmw 3 series (not full frontal): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XG8BQt4sHY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XG8BQt4sHY
- ISL 13y agoModern crash engineering is really impressive (that under-car view is really neat!) This 2009 vs. 1959 offset crash shows how much things have changed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joMK1WZjP7g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joMK1WZjP7g
- trafficlight 13y agoWow. The windshield doesn't even crack.
- kmfrk 13y agoYou have to consider that there is no engine in the front - just empty space for storage. That changes the game of frontal collisions completely.
- klinquist 13y ago0:58 - 1:07 of the first video link... the car continues to attempt to propel itself into the wall.
- _mulder_ 13y agoOnly for 0.3 seconds. The first camera shot at normal speed show's how quick this is all happening.
- 13y ago
- axylone 13y agoHere's the video of the Tesla pole test: http://youtu.be/_Al3IUHt9Wc?t=32s http://youtu.be/_Al3IUHt9Wc?t=32s Honda Accord for comparison: http://youtu.be/ycntFFUfGkU?t=30s http://youtu.be/ycntFFUfGkU?t=30s
- nkoren 13y agoOkay, that's impressive. The Accord isn't a bad car per se, but its dummy is clearly having a much worse day.
- duylamnguyenngo 13y agoIf Tesla can bring this maintain this level of vehicle safety to its lower priced vehicles (gen iii vehicles: http://insideevs.com/tesla-gen-iii-to-eliminate-price-premium-for-electric-vehicles-sales-could-hit-200000-units-per-year/ http://insideevs.com/tesla-gen-iii-to-eliminate-price-premiu...), then their dedication to quality, and not just economics, will be even more applaudable.
- IgorPartola 13y agoAnyone else notice Tesla's flying rear view mirror that nearly hit the dummy in the face? Maybe they forgot to apply the little alcohol wipe before gluing it on the windshield :).
- JVIDEL 13y agoThat's an Accord coupe, the B pillar is more thick than a 4-door version, wouldn't that mean the sedan would score even worse?
- mgolawala 13y agoTesla makes an impressive vehicle, but it is unfair to compare a ~$80K machine to a ~$30K one. A fairer comparison would be to a BMW 5xx or Mercedes E class. Tesla may still fair better but not by as huge a margin. Having said all that... wow, that is a surprisingly huge difference in results!
- Recoil42 13y ago
- agumonkey 13y agoIs it too far fetched to say he benefited from SpaceX research ? if so, this kind of gene transfer reminds me of Apple years when the iPhone benefited from iPod and Mac hard and software knowledge to leapfrog the competition, and then later helped the MBA do it again.
- mncolinlee 13y agoI would imagine this is less the case than Subaru and Saab benefiting from their own aeronautical research. Unlike Subaru and Saab, SpaceX is a different company with different engineers than Tesla. Rather, I think this speaks more to Elon Musk's uncanny ability to attract and hire good engineers.
- cheapsteak 13y agoSimilarly: "during validation of Model S roof crush protection at an independent commercial facility, the testing machine failed at just above 4 g's."