When I was in Europe I saw all these tiny two seat cars like the SMART running around town. They were easy to park anywhere and very fuel efficient. I would love to own one here in the states. However, everyone I brought this up with said they were a joke and would never survive "our roads" (like they don’t have cars in Europe). Well, check out this video that shows the good engineering that goes in to the SMART car's cage. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6605730767077503480 -John
I love the Smart cars and would love to own them here. The Sport version and the 2 door are sweet looking vehicles. The 4 door looks like a collection of different body panels put onto one car though. I'm not sure survivability against a large vehicle is the issue. They are geared and are best driven for intercity traffic. It appears a lot of American driving is more geared to long commutes that would really tear these vehicles apart. That is what my father-in-law in the UK says.
My understanding of things is that SUV's are made to truck safety standards, not car standards like minivans, and tend to collapse when they roll over. Which they can do partly because of the higher center of gravity. So pure mass or height isn't everything in an accident. I also saw the "Smart" cars in Europe. My kids thought that they were very interesting, as well. Being a small car person myself (VW bugs and Honda Civics), I thought that they were charming. To see that they are also engineered for safety would make me look closer at them if they were available here. -Roger
Although it seems to have held up well structurally, that's only part of what makes a crash survivable or not. They didn't do any measurements of the forces experienced by a person (or a crash test dummy). They also didn't look at how much intrusion there was in the passenger compartment (like whether or not a person's legs would be broken by movement of the dash and floor) nor did they look at whether the steering column moved up into the face/chest of a driver. Also, these Smart cars are so light, if you were in a collision w/even non-SUVs, you'd probably be screwed just due to simple physics and kinetic energy (=1/2 mv^2). The curb weight of ForTwo is 1631 lbs according to http://www.canadiandriver.com/articles/jm/05_4-2_cab.htm. In comparison, a current Prius weighs 2890 lbs, Corolla ranges from 2530-2670 lbs and a Camry ranges from 3164 3428 lbs depending on engine, trim and transmission. A 3/4 ton 4x4 Chevy Suburban weighs 6074 lbs! I've also seen Smart cars first hand at auto shows. The cars and and interiors feel VERY cheap. The Smart division has also been losing money and never been profitable. See: http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/arti...=73230581548062 http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/arti...=73230581548062
You're right, simply maintainging it's shape is not sufficient. How much of hte energy would be transferred to the occupants? That is the critical point. The car can come out of the crash looking just like it did before, but if a large portionof the enrgy went straight through the car to the passenger, you'd have omelets. As for the SMART looking and feeling cheap, it's becuase the ARE cheap. Concerning SUV's collapsing, you could always get a Volvo XC90 like ours. It's designed to not roll in anything short of severe circumstances, and then if it somehow does, the cage is so reinforced that it can survive just about anything short of a really high speed crash. It's likely the safest car on the road today.
minimal? I mean, most of the energy goes around this cage. but I agree with cwerdna, the interior is rather cheap.
BTW, the 1631 lb. weight of the FourTwo is comparable to that of a 91 Geo Metro if MSN Autos' stats are right. The manual non-convertibles supposedly weigh 1620-1693 lbs and they somehow have no data for the automatics (strange).
