Originally Posted by Shannow
Originally Posted by meep
To my knowledge this has not changed. Trucks have a mass advantage against smaller vehicles, but have disadvantages in rollover stability, exacerbated by lacking rollover strength. Newer ones seem to be catching up in rollover strength. A 3,000lb sedan going sideways in front of a 5500lb truck at 60 mph has more than enough energy to send the truck sideways into an epic roll. A 35mph accident on city streets will favor the truck in my arm-chair-engineer mind.
They have come a LOOOOOONG way...
My best engineer witnessed a Colorado come off the road at highway speeds, drifted onto the centre grasslands, slid a bit, overcorrected the slide, and the truck got tripped over and rolled. Landed on it's roof, and the lady driver forced the door open and got out.
Saw 4 people get out of a rolled Hilux the other week near work...out the windows due to orientation, but the ute was standing fairly and squarely on it's roof, not collapsed pillars like the old days.
I've seen more regular cars then utes on their roof over the last 35 years, and the modern ones are very good.
Originally Posted by meep
What I'm not sure about is crumple zone management. That sturdy BOF construction needed for doing truck things may not compromise as well as as unibody vehicle.
Again, that's changed...in Oz, the Colorado is a five star safety rated vehicle in the crash testing programme (even the Chinese LDV has stepped up to 5 stars)...the Mustang is 3.5 stars.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGdLvMh5OPs&t=140s
The US lagged well behind ROW in this regard. SUV drivers in particular were screaming when in 2008-2009 that the NTHSA updated their regulations which required that cabins not collapse/crush the occupants in the event of a rollover.
Originally Posted by meep
To my knowledge this has not changed. Trucks have a mass advantage against smaller vehicles, but have disadvantages in rollover stability, exacerbated by lacking rollover strength. Newer ones seem to be catching up in rollover strength. A 3,000lb sedan going sideways in front of a 5500lb truck at 60 mph has more than enough energy to send the truck sideways into an epic roll. A 35mph accident on city streets will favor the truck in my arm-chair-engineer mind.
They have come a LOOOOOONG way...
My best engineer witnessed a Colorado come off the road at highway speeds, drifted onto the centre grasslands, slid a bit, overcorrected the slide, and the truck got tripped over and rolled. Landed on it's roof, and the lady driver forced the door open and got out.
Saw 4 people get out of a rolled Hilux the other week near work...out the windows due to orientation, but the ute was standing fairly and squarely on it's roof, not collapsed pillars like the old days.
I've seen more regular cars then utes on their roof over the last 35 years, and the modern ones are very good.
Originally Posted by meep
What I'm not sure about is crumple zone management. That sturdy BOF construction needed for doing truck things may not compromise as well as as unibody vehicle.
Again, that's changed...in Oz, the Colorado is a five star safety rated vehicle in the crash testing programme (even the Chinese LDV has stepped up to 5 stars)...the Mustang is 3.5 stars.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGdLvMh5OPs&t=140s
The US lagged well behind ROW in this regard. SUV drivers in particular were screaming when in 2008-2009 that the NTHSA updated their regulations which required that cabins not collapse/crush the occupants in the event of a rollover.