WOW Chinese car crash test! Scary!

[Spitty]

Originally Posted By: farrarfan1
Originally Posted By: Spitty
I have often wondered, what would happen if your arm was across the steering wheel (as if taking sudden evasive action) when the Airbag goes off!

It will be driven back into your face by the airbag. Coffee cups and cigarettes are quite interesting during airbag deployments.


That's about what I thought. Are there stats on this? How many people recive injuries after a 20mph impact fron a self inflicted 200mph sucker punch?

Interesting feature of the Big v small car impacts, the camera is static, the impact takes place in the centre of the frame, both cars (to a large degree) stay in the frame (or are deflected to the side) the driver of both cars decelerate over a quite similar space/time in relation to the direction of travel.
Meaning: I would have thought the small car would have been driven backward far more.
It would be interesting to know what the deceleration of each driver was!

 

[mcrn]

Originally Posted By: Spitty
Originally Posted By: farrarfan1
Originally Posted By: Spitty
I have often wondered, what would happen if your arm was across the steering wheel (as if taking sudden evasive action) when the Airbag goes off!

It will be driven back into your face by the airbag. Coffee cups and cigarettes are quite interesting during airbag deployments.


That's about what I thought. Are there stats on this? How many people recive injuries after a 20mph impact fron a self inflicted 200mph sucker punch?

Interesting feature of the Big v small car impacts, the camera is static, the impact takes place in the centre of the frame, both cars (to a large degree) stay in the frame (or are deflected to the side) the driver of both cars decelerate over a quite similar space/time in relation to the direction of travel.
Meaning: I would have thought the small car would have been driven backward far more.
It would be interesting to know what the deceleration of each driver was!


I thought the smart car was driven back much farther? The Benz seems to hold its line where the smart car is literally thrown backwards and flips it. The Merc just kind of stays on its coarse . So I think the force was much greater on the smart car. It seems to me the people inside would have a lot more "snap" to deal with.

 

[NJC]

Originally Posted By: Pablo
Originally Posted By: NJC
Originally Posted By: Spitty
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O11Rr3wuDeE

That one damaged my faith in Volvo's bulletproof image.

The basic design for that 940 came out in 1984. (740) So it was designed in the early 80's. Plus as mentioned the corner strike missed the engine, and actually we don't even know it hasn't been wrecked before. As stated, new cars are better.....I wonder how a 240 would have done?

Missing the engine was THE critical factor. I think a 240 would have done better ... IIRC, Volvo tried to save weight on the 740 (940) series.

 

[farrarfan1]

Originally Posted By: Spitty
Originally Posted By: farrarfan1
Originally Posted By: Spitty
I have often wondered, what would happen if your arm was across the steering wheel (as if taking sudden evasive action) when the Airbag goes off!

It will be driven back into your face by the airbag. Coffee cups and cigarettes are quite interesting during airbag deployments.


That's about what I thought. Are there stats on this? How many people recive injuries after a 20mph impact fron a self inflicted 200mph sucker punch?

Interesting feature of the Big v small car impacts, the camera is static, the impact takes place in the centre of the frame, both cars (to a large degree) stay in the frame (or are deflected to the side) the driver of both cars decelerate over a quite similar space/time in relation to the direction of travel.
Meaning: I would have thought the small car would have been driven backward far more.
It would be interesting to know what the deceleration of each driver was!


Actually, if you watch the video closely you'll see that the larger vehicle continues on in it's original direction before coming to final rest, while the smaller car actually reverses direction. There is a math formula that calculates the change in velocity (delta V )for the occupants. In this case the delta V would be much greater on the occupants of the smaller car due to the occuppants positive acceleration in their original direction instantly reversing itself and becoming positive acceleration in the opposite direction.The occupants of the larger car went from positive acceleration to negative acceleration while still going the same direction, over a longer period of time before final rest.

 

[Spitty]

Sorry, you are right, I'm getting my Vid's mixed here, I was thinking of the Volvo v Renault crash. Still the reverse motion was not as great as I would have thought. Pity they did not show a good view of the follow through in the Benz video :-(
It would be nice to know what kind of deceleration is survivable?
I'm thinking here of F1 race crashes, 'G' loads must be substantial but survivable.

 

[mcrn]

I think the key to surviving something like that has a lot to do with stabilizing the persons neck. I know the human body can take a large amount of g forces for very brief periods of time. Its just making sure the neck does not snap forward or backwards too violently.

 

[Spitty]

Agree.
This one is a 4x4 crash.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbEa3C2vL7U

 

[farrarfan1]

Originally Posted By: Spitty
Sorry, you are right, I'm getting my Vid's mixed here, I was thinking of the Volvo v Renault crash. Still the reverse motion was not as great as I would have thought. Pity they did not show a good view of the follow through in the Benz video :-(
It would be nice to know what kind of deceleration is survivable?
I'm thinking here of F1 race crashes, 'G' loads must be substantial but survivable.


Comparing crashes involving racecars that are as well built as NASCAR and F1 cars are to typical passenger vehicles is a little tricky. The physics are the same but the safety equipment in the racecars make a dramatic difference. When you see a racecar hit a wall at 190-200 MPH most of the time they glance off and may only lose 40-50 MPH due to the impact and this is over a relatively long amount of time. mcrn is correct about stabilizing the neck, which the head and neck restraint systems are very effective at. Toss in the heavy 5-point harnesses that are worn as tight as possible,impact absorbing seats, roll cage assemblies and helmets make them very survivable.

Spitty, there are some real ballpark estimates that say a delta V of 35 MPH is the threshold for fatal injuries for the human body. In other words a 35 MPH impact into a solid fixed barrier would cause the aorta to rupture or the neck to break simply due to the sudden stop of forward movement. I've seen some estimates that it could be as low as 20 MPH or as high as 50 MPH. These figures are pretty useless because there are so many variables.

 

[olddognewtrks]

Regarding Air Bag deployment (i.e. violent explosion) when your arm is across the wheel:

My dear old Mom needed MAJOR right forearm reconstruction from a "turning left when hit" accident. Also suffered a concussion-woke up only after the medics crawled into her mangled Mercury Sable.

So....I've been trying to teach myself the "shuffle" (I believe this is taught by the British Police) where you divide the wheel into two halves, left and right. Your left hand works 6 to 9 to 12 o'clock, and the right 6 to 3 to 12. Your hands never cross, and so you never destroy your forearm with the airbag. Hard to make it smooth, but it gets better with practice. I've even made a smooth tailslide recovery in the wet with this method. Anybody has any more input on this method, chime in please.

 

[Spitty]

That's standard practice when you take your driver test in the U.K. it's a push pull motion, you can move the wheel very quickly with practice, you have great leverage (power steering used to be only for up market cars in the U.K. and even then not the norm)

 

[Squishy]

I think it's the preferred steering method for autocross drivers. I can't seem to adopt it, though. Makes me feel like a bus driver.

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: olddognewtrks
So....I've been trying to teach myself the "shuffle" (I believe this is taught by the British Police) where you divide the wheel into two halves, left and right. Your left hand works 6 to 9 to 12 o'clock, and the right 6 to 3 to 12. Your hands never cross


If your cross your arms or hands while turning the wheel during a driving test in Germany, you fail the test. Every driving student is taught how to properly steer a vehicle. Crossing your arms or hands when turning the wheel has been a no-no since before the proliferation of airbags in the early '80s. Another no-no that will cause failing a driving test is the inverted hand (palm up) when turning the wheel.

 

[Shannow]

mori, same here.

Because my sister is disabled, she's got approval to use a "donut knob" on her wheel.

 

[Shannow]

mcrn,
the car was a Holden Commodore (thus the nicks "crumpledore" and Commondore").

Baed on an Opel design, available with 1.9l pushrod 4, 173 c.i. I6, 202 c.i. I6, 253 ci V-8, 308 c.i. V-8. Sixes were around 1100kg, 8s under 1200kg. Available with 4 wheel disks. MacPherson strut front end, 4 link with panhard rear.

Went and handled well.

Based on a widened Opel (somethingoroterthatmoriprobablyknows).

I don't think that crash was at the standard test speed, although I HAVE seen a couple in similar condition at the side of the road, and in Police forensic bays.

 

[Steve S]

The Chinese are going to be exempt from any laws.look at their products now imported.

 

[GMGuy]

Quote:
The Chinese are going to be exempt from any laws.look at their products now imported.


If thats true, then you know what gift to give to the person you just really don't like. =-)

Alex.

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: Shannow
Based on a widened Opel (somethingoroterthatmoriprobablyknows)


An Opel Admiral was essentially the same vehicle as the Opel Commodore or Opel Kapitän. The cars differed in trim, features and options. The three cars shared the same body and were the largest Opel passenger cars at their time.

A 1970s Opel Kapitän/Commodore/Admiral looked like this: