Wondering about 2010 Prius govt crash tests?

When I bought our family vehicle (minivan), safety was the top concern and seating ease/flexibility was another main consideration. I bought a 4400 pound behemoth with top ratings all around, as well as side curtain airbags and sensors for all 3 rows, rollover protection and stability control.

For this purchase, we were looking for a commuter vehicle. Safety was a concern, but fuel economy and driver comfort/position/ergonomics were as important or more. Otherwise, we wouldn't have considered a vehicle that didn't have crash test results yet.

So, I guess it all depends on what your requirements are at the time of purchase. I had pretty good confidence that the 3rd gen Prius would get results no worse than the 2nd gen and that was adequate for this purpose. Now if the final results come out and include a 2-star rating or a more than one 3-star rating, I'd even consider swapping it, though I doubt my wife would;-)

 

Prius ncap results are in: Euro NCAP - For safer cars | Toyota Prius

 

This test notes marginal protection in the event of a rear impact.

I wonder if the headrests are the same in the US model?

These results also note marginal protection in the event of a severe side pole impact.

As for Eddiehaskell's question about why buy a smaller car- just a quick check on safercar.gov shows several cars such as the civic, insight, and fusion all recieved better scores than the 2010 Prius.

I had high expectations that the Prius would be worthy of a 5 star rating.

Also Eddie- the safercar.gov states something that I found interesting:

"Frontal crash rating results can only be compared to other vehicles in the same class and whose weight is plus or minus 250 lbs of the vehicle being rated. This is so because a frontal crash rating into a fixed barrier represents a crash between two vehicles of the same weight." Safercar.gov

 

I also noted that the Prius is slightly worse than the Insight and Polo for front seat occupants. Didn't have time to compare to a lot of other cars. They should have done better on the headrests though. The Avensis has much better whiplash protection.

 

Great, just don't give her the hand-me-down 15 year old _insert whichever tanker car here_ thinking that she'll always be safer in the bigger car. If the old car breaks down and she is "attacked" by the hitched ride, hit on the side of the road by the other driver not paying attention, etc., then you'll always wonder if she would have been better off in the more reliable but smaller Prius. Carried to logical conclusion, we should all give our teens the newest and biggest car in the family (except when we have to send them to the shrink for the night they ran over the little Prius driver in their new Excursion cause they were talking on the cell phone and missed that stop sign!).

Wow, its all confusing, huh!

 

I also asked that on the Euro NCAP thread from a few days ago. I don't think anyone had an answer.

I thought the text description was a lot more nitpicky than the overall results. In that they gave it a top rating, it must have been much better than marginal overall, perhaps marginal for vehicles in the 5-star rating? I'm not sure how they weight their results.

Exactly. Weight is a factor in head-on crashes, full width or offset. You may well find that in car vs. car, a 4500 pound model with a 2-star rating fares better vs. a 2500 pound model with a 5-star rating. Hard to predict this, but one website makes a good attempt by using statistics to factor weight in with crash ratings- www.informedforlife.org . Now if you're hitting a wall or pole, you'd generally rather be in a 5-star rated model, regardless of the weight of your vehicle.

 

What are the percentages of accidents in which the vehicles are hit head-on? The rating system seems to be weighted towards accidents that involve hitting a stationary object. If the overwhelming number of accidents are of this sort, then buying a heavier vehicle has a neglible effect on it's safety record.

 

Vehicle vs. vehicle are the most common type of crash and frontal zone crashes are the most common type of serious crashes. I believe full width frontal and frontal offset are roughly equal in frequency.

I did a quick cross tab of initial impact direction vs. crash type from the fars database (www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov). Vehicle vs. vehicle crashes account for roughly 50% of frontal crash zone incidents. Vehicle vs. pedestrians are #2 with about 14%. Vehicle vs. tree are third with roughly 7%, followed by the myriad of other crash types.

You can do a number of different variables, including most harmful rather than initial point of impact (esp if multiple vehicles or both a vehicle and a fixed object were involved).

Informed for life has a pretty good detailed description of how they weight their results and calculators for you to enter your own data. They are also pretty good at replying to concerns and questions over their methods.

 

Disappointing, since most new Toyota models get 5 stars and they made the Prius bigger. Oh well.

 

I do not pretend to understand the ratings, but it seems obvious to me that the weight of a vehicle would be a major factor. What each if us must evaluate is what are we willing to sacrifice to achieve our priority. Toyota has obviously engineered a safe vehicle, but in giving up weight to achieve fuel efficiency, they pre-determined that it will not fare as well in a head on collision with a Ford Explorer (for example). But the Ford Explorer will not be the winner in a head-on with an 18 wheeler; and it in turn, will not show well against a railroad locomotive.

Also remember, that modern vehicles are engineered with crush zones to protect the occupant. Look at race cars that are completely destroyed ... yet the driver walks away.

 

4 and 5 stars means PASS
3 stars is Marginal
1 and 2 stars means FAIL

No modern cars get 1 or 2 stars. Most don't even get 3 stars. They all get 4 or 5 stars and the NHTSA admits that their testing indicates almost nothing.

The Fed's side impact tests are worse yet. They indicate less than nothing. The testing were designed back in the 70s when this subject was first raised and the protocols have never been updated.

Oh yeah, they don't even test for rear end collisions either.


The only testing results worth mentioning IMO are those of the IIHS.

 

This may be true, but what I'm saying is that in the average crash, I doubt the 5-star 2800lb Civic would fare as well as the 4000lb 5-star Taurus. Thus, if safety is of extreme importance (to the degree of being even 1% better), I would suggest skipping the Civic/Prius/Insight and buying the 5-star car with more mass.

IIHS says: "Size and weight affect injury likelihood in all kinds of crashes. In a collision involving two vehicles that differ in size and weight, the people in the smaller, lighter vehicle will be at a disadvantage. The bigger, heavier vehicle will push the smaller, lighter one backward during the impact. This means there will be less force on the occupants of the heavier vehicle and more on the people in the lighter vehicle. Greater force means greater risk, so the likelihood of injury goes up in the smaller, lighter vehicle."

 

The NCAP frontal tests do lack differentiation. That certainly makes them much less useful than a test with a full spread of results. That doesn't make them useless, though. There is still a meaningful correlation between the star ratings and risk of injury and the mere presence of the test makes overall design better than if there was solely a full width frontal or frontal offset test.

Not sure when they were designed, but they were implemented in the late 90s. The test simulates a car level bumper and an adult size dummy. The IIHS test simulates a higher SUV type bumper and a smaller female dummy. The tests are complementary for this reason. It's possible to be in either type of crash.

The IIHS doesn't do a rear crash test, either. There is an IIHS evaluation of head restraints and vehicle seats, combined with a sled test of certain seats that pass basic geometry constraints.

While outside of NCAP, the federal standards do require a lower speed rear end test. The results are essentially pass/fail, mostly for fuel system integrity.

The NHTSA NCAP testing will be updated and revised for 2011 model year vehicles, a bit later than the planned phase-in for 2010 vehicles.

 

Funny how people rationalize the lower rating. But I will say that with all the engineering Toyota spent on the Prius, it should have aced the official government test where they sell 100,000 examples of their model.

 

My disappointment is in the Prius only acheiving a 4 star rating. It is the car I own. At this point - as an owner of a Prius- I must say I am disappointed. If you are happy with the 4 star rating- more power to you.

I am making a statement that I had assumed the Prius was as safe as comparable size cars. It is not (according to the ratings posted yesterday).

I think that is a valid issue to address on a forum dedicated to the Prius.

 

I'm pretty neutral on the issue and I think it's perfectly valid to discuss it. My comments were all in reference to this comment:

In this specific case, I don't believe a 5-star rating should matter because the Prius shouldn't even be a consideration no matter what it's rated at. IMO, buying the largest vehicle with a 5-star rating would be the way to go.

 

Ratings are back up.

Safercar.gov

 

The auto-dimming rearview mirrors are not listed as an option. Why?

Also notice that they removed the hubcaps for the test.