“5 Stars”...How Safe Is That?

[Bartek S.]

What exactly does the government “5 Star Crash Rating” mean? You won’t believe the answer!! If you’re in an accident, these ratings may not help you.

Almost every car company proudly displays their “5 Star Safety Crash Rating”, each manufacturer boasting their cars are safer than the others. But what does it all mean to you? How do they determine safety and how do they come up with a star program? Does a vehicle with a less than 5 star rating really mean it’s not safe to drive?

Let me begin to explain what they are all talking about. The ratings are determined by crash dummies, wired with sensors, placed in vehicles front and rear seats, and crashed into barriers to simulate an accident. But before we get into the particulars, let’s first understand the parameters.


1. The tests are conducted at speeds of 35 to 38.5 mph. Wait a minute.....35-38.5 mph? Who drives 35-38.5 mph. when the rest of the world is traveling at 45-75 mph? The government safety ratings do not cover anything over 38.5 mph. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety raises the bar though...they test at 40mph; a full 1 1⁄2 mile per hour faster...zoom, zoom.

2. Crash dummies only simulate full size adults, not teens, not children, not infants. Aren’t teenagers, children and infants passengers too? Why don’t they count in the ‘rating’ system?The crash dummies are wearing seat belts in all cases, front and rear seats...(everyone in vehicles always wears their seat belts, don’t they?).

3. The crash dummies are wired to measure injuries to head, neck, chest, pelvis, legs and feet, but all these findings are not included in the rating. The ratings only measure head and chest injuries for frontal crashes and head injuries only for side crashes (evidently, other injuries are not serious enough to count in a government study).

4. Impact assumptions are for similar vehicles, differing no more than 250 lbs. This means if you are driving a small, full size or luxury car and you hit an SUV or a minivan...the rating doesn’t count (and it certainly doesn’t count if you happen to hit a tractor trailer...those crashes might change the star ratings).

5. Finally, the rating is only referring to injuries that require immediate hospitalization or are life-threatening.

How about rear-end crashes, what are the ratings for that? Well, here’s what the government says about that:

“NHTSA’s New Car Assessment Program has a limited budget and must
concentrate its ratings on front and side-impact crashes which every year are
responsible for the highest percentage of deaths and serious injuries.”

Here is a summary of the ratings we so proudly hold valuable...

For frontal crash ratings

=10 percent or less chance of serious injury

=11 percent to 20 percent chance of serious injury

=21 percent to 35 percent chance of serious injury

=36 percent to 45 percent chance of serious injury

=46 percent or greater chance of serious injury

For side crash ratings

=5 percent or less chance of serious injury

=6 percent to 10 percent chance of serious injury

=11 percent to 20 percent chance of serious injury

=21 percent to 25 percent chance of serious injury

=26 percent or greater chance of serious injury

...and here’s what this all means to you.

1) If you happen to be in a crash faster than 38.5 mph, forget about the rating scales altogether!

2) If you are a teen, child or infant sitting anywhere in the car, forget about the rating scale altogether!

3) If you hit any vehicle that is larger, smaller, or not almost exactly what you are driving, forget about the rating scale altogether!

4) If you are not wearing your seat belt, forget about the rating scale altogether!

5) If someone at the accident scene says “you look fine”, forget about the rating scale altogether!

6) If you happen to be driving a “5 Star Rated” vehicle at 32 mph, hit a car head-on exactly like yours and are
wearing your seat belt, according to the ratings you still have a 1 in 10 chance of being killed!

7) Lastly, if you are driving a “1 Star Rated” vehicle (I don’t know of any) and are in the same accident, you still have a 50-50 chance of surviving.

It seems that we have a rating system that sounds good, seems like a good measurement of safety, and should provide us with adequate information regarding the dangers of an accident. But for goodness sake, our rating systems barely work for restaurants and do nothing for the motion picture or record industry. How can we think, even for a moment, that it will save our life?

On one hand, airbags and seat belts have certainly saved people from serious injury. But on the other hand, the truth is we have created a “Star System” offering incredible false security; a means of telling ourselves that we are totally protected should we get into an accident, when in fact we are barely protected at best. The truth is we are not driving around in a “bubble of airbag safety” by any means. Regardless of the safety rating of any vehicle we must drive as if our life depended on it! It does!!

Unibody construction, seat belts, side impact bars in our doors, front, side, knee airbags and curtains, shock absorbing bumpers and crumple zones are all good ideas. But we must be fundamentally aware that none of these safety items will save us if we are driving at normal speeds, and an oncoming vehicle crosses into our lane.

Driving on today’s roads, with speed limits up to 75 mph is a serious and life threatening event. We need to depend on ourselves, not on a rating system.

So the next time you hear about a “5 Star Rated” vehicle, ask yourself “How safe is that?”.

 

[Merc1]

Thanks for posting this. I've been saying this for years and years on various sites about car safety, that government ratings can only carry you so far.

The companies that know something about safety are the ones that go above and beyond the lab tests by collecting their cars after real-world crashes and improving them based on THAT data. This is why I would never, ever buy certain Japanese, Korean or even American cars because they boast about getting this or that number of stars for this and that in government crash tests. Though safety is not my number 1 thing so I might still wind up with one of these jolopies!

Any automaker can engineer a car to pass these tests thesedays so god help anyone that has a car that can't even meet these standards. Say like the Chinese. Can you imagine what a piece of crap their producing if they can't even pass the "lab" tests? Mercedes, Audi, Volvo, Renault, Citroen, and Saab (the real ones not the rebadged GM junk) are still the ones that at the very least have a clue beyond regulated tests as to what "safety" really is, IMO.

Hell every car should get 5 stars considering the huge difference between the speeds used in these controlled tests and the real world speeds we all know we drive at.

M

 

[wltsm]

This is quite an interesting video from Top Gear, at the end it shows you a crashed 5 star, 4 star and a 3 star Euro Ncap car!

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[MikeJ]

I've noticed that NHTSA and EuroNCAP results can differ considerably; some cars which did abysmally at EuroNCAP received rather good results from NHTSA... Even though there's been talk of cars being engineered to do well at the EuroNCAP test rather than real-world accidents, I'd still be more inclined to trust the European system.

 

[Merc1]

I agree.

M

 

[Poverty]

I dont trust any safety rating organisations.

I only trust track proven german and scandinavian engineering.

 

[Mr Robert]

Insurance company Folksam makes a list of cars and their safety level based purely on real life accidents. I would trust that more than i trust any safety rating organisation...

 

[Rainer271]

Euro NCAP to begin testing Autonomous Pedestrian Detection Systems


Starting with 2010 or so, Euro NCAP has continuously modified its testing procedures. To the annoyance of some but for the well-being of just about everyone, European new vehicle crash tests have become downright draconian, but Euro NCAP won't stop here.

Keeping up with changing times, the safety organization will introduce yet another test beginning with 2016. Called “Autonomous Pedestrian Detection Test,” its name is pretty much self-explanatory, and its introduction comes as no surprise after many new cars have begun to offer various forms of Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) systems.

“These new tests are the first in the world to assess highly automated vehicle features and driver assistance systems from the pedestrian’s perspective. Many new cars now offer some form of AEB system that can help prevent car-to-car collisions, but only some are also able to detect pedestrians. By checking the results on Euro NCAP’s website, consumers will be able to verify manufacturers’ safety claims and choose the right AEB option,” said Dr. Michiel van Ratingen, Euro NCAP Secretary General.

The safety organization will, therefore, test AEB systems using three pedestrian simulations that are most common in urban driving: adults either walking or running right into a vehicle's path or a child emerging from behind a visibility obstruction, such as another parked vehicle.

Cars fitted with pedestrian-sensing AEB systems should prevent collisions with special “pedestrian dummies” at speeds of up to 40 km/h (25 mph). At speeds between 40 and 60 km/h (25-37 mph), the eventual collision speed should stay below 40 km/h (25 mph) to improve the chances of survival. Those vehicles that manage to score well in these tests will thus have a better chance at achieving full five stars.

Pedestrian-sensing AEB systems are already offered on some of the cars that Euro NCAP has tested in 2015, but they will probably have to be retested in 2016, to see how they follow the new prerogatives.

Apparently, real world crash data from the UK and Germany shows that the introduction of autonomous braking systems on cars can prevent about one in five fatal pedestrian collisions, so the more effective AEB systems are, more lives can be saved.

http://www.autoevolution.com/news/e...mous-pedestrian-detection-systems-101925.html

 

[Rainer271]

NHTSA and IIHS Crash Test Scores Explained



Almost 100 years ago, car passengers faced risks of death even in a minor – by today's standards – fender bender. Automobile safety has evolved so much in recent times that it is possible to escape with minor or even no injuries at all from a 80 km/h (50 mph) head-on crash. In the past five decades, a few independent organizations have started performing well-established crash tests of which results have now become a very important part in the buying decision of almost every new car customer. This article will try to explain the criteria by which each American crash testing organization achieves its results.

NHTSA and IIHS

The oldest government sponsored crash tests in the US were first conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Association (NHTSA) in 1978. A division of the US Department of Transportation, the NHTSA association began a series of test which are now referred as the New Car Assessment Program (NCAP), or “government 5-star ratings”. The second American association to perform large scale crash testing was the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), which is an organization sponsored by insurance companies. They began wrecking cars in the name of science and safety in 1995.

Although both organizations are crash testing cars for a similar reason, each has a different procedure to achieve desired results. Both perform frontal and side crash tests, although conduced differently. Plus, the IIHS assesses seat and head restraints in rear crashes, bumpers in low-speed fender benders, while the NHTSA also has a rollover crash test.

Not every car on the market is tested, but vehicles to be voluntarily rammed into a wall are usually chosen following a customer popularity factor. We'll now have a look at how each crash test is conducted, so that car customers everywhere should better understand the reasoning behind each result.


Frontal Crash Test (NHTSA)

As we mentioned before, the NHTSA and IIHS each have their own way of conducting the tests. Let's first look at the NHTSA one. In the frontal test, two average male sized crash test dummies are placed in the driver and front-passenger seat and are secured by the car's compulsory seatbelts. The vehicle is then rammed head-on into a fixed barrier at a speed of 35 mph (56 km/h). This speed tries to recreate the impact of two similarly weighed vehicles colliding each other head-on at the aforementioned speed.

The force inflicted upon the high-tech dummies is then measured, and the NHTSA dudes give the car a star rating based on each dummie's chance of serious injury, expressed in percentages. By the way, by “serious injury” the NHTSA means an injury that requires immediate hospitalization and may be life-threatening, so a broken finger nail doesn't count. The star ratings used by the NHTSA make everything look like a game of Russian roulette, but here they are anyway:

5 Stars (meaning 10% or less chance of serious injury)
4 Stars (meaning 11-20% chance of serious injury)
3 Stars (meaning 21-35% chance of serious injury)
2 Stars (meaning 36-45% chance of serious injury)
1 Star (meaning 46% or greater chance of serious injury)

Frontal Crash Test (IIHS)

The IIHS organization conducts two slightly different frontal tests. In the first, the vehicle is hitting a deformable barrier in an off-set manner, meaning that only the driver's front end is struck. The test is conducted at 40 mph (64 km/h), and around 40 percent of the car's front end impacts the deformable wall. In the second one, called the small overlap-front test, only 25 percent of the vehicle's front end strikes a non-deformable barrier at 40 mph (64 km/h).

Trying to be even more special, the IIHS doesn't use stars to rank the vehicle tested. Instead, it uses kindergarden-like ratings: Good, Acceptable, Marginal and Poor. On top of that, cars that do exceptionally well in all crash tests are giveon one of two awards, each being more important than the other: Top Safety Pick or Top safety Pick + for the best performing cars.

Unlike the NHTSA tests, these ratings do not correlate to a chance of injury because the IIHS is assessing how the overall vehicle structure performs, and not just the occupants. Considering how different the two frontal tests are to each other, both organizations reckon that the tests do not compete, but instead complement each other.


Side-Impact Crash Test (NHTSA)

In the NHTSA test, two crash test dummies that represent average-sized men are put in the car. One sits in the driver seat and one in the rear, just behind the driver. The vehicle is then struck by a 3,015-pound (1368 kg) barrier travelling at 38.5 mph (62 km/h). Computers connected to the dummies measure the force of the impact to the head, neck, chest and pelvis, but the star ratings are used to show only the chance of serious injury to the chest. The NHTSA separately reports in a “safety concern” if there is any likelihood of serious head injuries. These are the Side-Impact Tests ratings:

5 Stars (meaning 5% or less chance of serious injury)
4 Stars (meaning 6-10% chance of serious injury)
3 Stars (meaning 11-20% chance of serious injury)
2 Stars (meaning 21-25% chance of serious injury)
1 Star (meaning 26% or greater chance of serious injury)

Side-Impact Crash Test (IIHS)

Naturally, the IIHS does the side-impact test a little bit different. First of all, the two dummies represent small women or children, but they are placed just like in the NHTSA test. Second of all, the deformable barrier is differently shaped, weighs 3,300 pounds (1497 kg) and is taller than the one used by the NHTSA.

After being slammed into the side of the vehicle at 31 mph (50 km/h), computers measure the potential of serious injuries to the head, neck, chest, abdomen, pelvis and femur of the crash test dummies. The test rating also comprises of marks from “Good” to “Poor” to asses the severity of the accident on the dummies. Because this test is so severe, it practically emulates an accident in which the “victim” car is slammed by a full-size SUV.

Rollover Test (NHTSA)

For the moment, only the NHTSA is conducting rollover tests in the United States. Put into action since 2004, the test actually comprises of static test and a motion one. The motion test consists of a pre-weighed vehicle which simulates being loaded with five passengers and a full tank of fuel. the car is then put to simulate and emergency lane change while computers are measuring the movement of the tires. If two tires simultaneously lift at least 2 inches (5.1 centimeters) off of the ground, the car is considered to be in the risk of rolling over. The results are rated just like the other tests:

5 Stars (meaning 10% or less risk of rolling over)
4 Stars (meaning 10-20% risk of rolling over)
3 Stars (meaning 20-30% risk of rolling over)
2 Stars (meaning 30-40% risk of rolling over)
1 Star (meaning 40% or greater risk of rolling over)

Rear Crash Test (IIHS)

To complement the NHTSA again, currently the IIHS is the only US organization to asses rear crash protection. Just like in the NHTSA rollover test, both static and motion tests are required for the IIHS to evaluate the rear crash protection. In the static one, a crash test dummy sized as an average adult male is put in the driving seat which is tilted at about 25 degrees. The head restraint should be 3.5 inches or less (8.9 centimeters) from the top of the head and less than four inches (10.1 centimeters) from the back of the head. If it is adjustable (which in most cases is), measurements are taken in both the down position and the most favorable position. Just like in the other IIHS tests, a rating which ranges from “Good” to “Poor” is given.

Only the restraints which get the “Good” or “Acceptable” ratings move on to the motion test, in which the same dummy gets to sit in the driver's seat. The vehicle is then put on a sled which simulates the car being slammed by another similarly weighing vehicle at 20 mph (32 km/h) from the rear. Computers then measure the impact forces that acted on the head, neck, spine and torso. A combined overall rating between the static and the motion test is then achieved.

Low-Speed Bumper Test (IIHS)

Another crash test which is skipped by the NHTSA but conducted by the IIHS is the low-speed bumper test. A vehicle is crashed two times at 5 mph (8 km/h) into a flat barrier (with both the front and the rear bumpers), one time into an angled barrier with the front bumper and then into a short pole with the rear bumper. The usual “Good” to “Poor” ratings are then given, only this time they are based on the accident repair costs.

In another similar Auto Guide we will talk about two other major international crash testing organizations: the EuroNCAP and the down under ANCAP.

Read more: http://www.autoevolution.com/news/nhtsa-and-iihs-crash-test-scores-explained-4239.html#ixzz42i9yXxsr

 

[carfollower]

The cars are safe only upto a particular speed.
I have seen many cases where cars that are said to be one of the safest have had their occupants loose their lives because they were above a certain speed.

I sometimes feel that now a days cars are designed to just score good rating in the lab test but on road the results are far from expectations. This happens specially with the low cost cars.

Drive Safe!

 

[Monster]

The cars are safe only upto a particular speed.
I have seen many cases where cars that are said to be one of the safest have had their occupants loose their lives because they were above a certain speed.

I sometimes feel that now a days cars are designed to just score good rating in the lab test but on road the results are far from expectations. This happens specially with the low cost cars.

Drive Safe!

True, I read that any direct impact with a solid object at 80km/h will almost result in fatality because the human body can't take the sudden deceleration from that speed. Unless we start building lighter cars and use materials with high energy absorption rate eg carbon fiber, then there is only so much engineers can do. But they are trying with their development of auto emergency braking and hazard detection systems.

 

[Mick Briesgau]

I sometimes feel that now a days cars are designed to just score good rating in the lab test but on road the results are far from expectations.

A few manufacturers are actually doing research of real life accident situations. The results of this research is making it's way into safety of production cars. Mercedes-Benz is doing this and I mean Volvo as well.

 

[Zafiro]

A few manufacturers are actually doing research of real life accident situations. The results of this research is making it's way into safety of production cars. Mercedes-Benz is doing this and I mean Volvo as well.

Swedish insurance companies as well. They have statics about all kind of carbrands which they present from time to times.

 

[carfollower]

A few manufacturers are actually doing research of real life accident situations. The results of this research is making it's way into safety of production cars. Mercedes-Benz is doing this and I mean Volvo as well.

Volvo has been the leader in safety it seems.

Even Mercedes-Benz keeps on researching and innovating safety features. I had a chance to get close to the Mercedes ESF 2009 concept car which showcased the level of safety features a modern luxury can could have.