Manufacturers Face Tougher Safety Tests for New Cars
Cited: The Wall Street Journal
It is going to be more difficult for vehicles to receive top grades on their respective safety tests thanks to the government and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). As a safety-research arm of the insurance industry, IIHS says that 2010 vehicle models will have to be better to get its “top safety pick” award if it does not get a good rating on the new test of roof strength. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is also creating a more vigorous crash testing system for 2011 models starting next year. This new safety rating system involves smashing vehicles in the polls and new overall safety rating scores.
The bottom line: Fewer vehicles are likely to get five-star ratings in the NHTSA’s one-to-five-star scoring system, and fewer vehicles are going to get the Insurance Institute’s top safety pick award, representatives of the NHTSA and IIHS say. In 2009, a record 84 vehicles earned the IIHS’s top endorsement.
This could be confusing for consumers, and present both engineering and communications challenges to car makers. Cars and trucks may get lower scores and fewer stamps of approval, but they won’t suddenly be less safe. Instead, the pressure will be on manufacturers to take vehicles to a higher level of safety.
Auto makers have done so well over the past two decades at figuring out how to engineer vehicles to pass safety tests that consumers now face the Lake Wobegon problem when they shop: All the cars are above average. So safety evaluators are raising the bar—the better to show consumers that there still are important differences in safety technology and engineering among the hundreds of models on the market.
Yet the Insurance Institute and the NHTSA are not instituting tougher tests in the same way or at the same pace, which could add to the challenges for consumers trying to plug safety scores into their new-vehicle buying decisions.
The IIHS’s latest focus is on roof strength. In its newest round of testing, released last week, the institute 
rated six mini-cars for their ability to withstand a test designed to simulate the roof-crushing impact of a rollover accident. The cars tested—the Chevy Aveo, Smart Fortwo, Honda Fit, Mini Cooper, Hyundai Accent and Toyota Yaris—are the kind of highly fuel-efficient cars the government’s just-concluded “cash for clunkers” program encouraged consumers to buy.
Tops in the small-car roof-crush test was the Smart Fortwo—a car the IIHS slammed in April when it was making a different point about how tiny cars fare poorly in head-on crashes with larger ones. But if a Fortwo flips on its roof, the Insurance Institute test predicts it will do a good job protecting the occupants, because it can withstand 5.4 times the car’s weight.
The worst performer was General Motors Co.’s Chevrolet Aveo, a Korean-made car that supported 3.09 times its own weight in the crush test—double the current federal standard. The Aveo’s score was also a touch better than the new federal standard of three times the vehicle weight that phases in starting in 2012.
“One test alone doesn’t determine whether a vehicle is safe,” says GM spokeswoman Janine Fruehan.
The IIHS doesn’t rely one test for its top safety pick awards, but it is making a point with its new roof-crush requirement. Its president, Adrian Lund, said in a statement that the government’s “leisurely phase-in of the new standard means roofs won’t have to get stronger right away, so we plan to continue rating vehicle roof strength for the foreseeable future. We want to reward manufacturers who are ahead of their competition when it comes to providing protection in rollover crashes.”
The government’s decision to phase in the new standard between 2012 and 2016 responds to pleas from the auto industry, which, besides being battered and bruised financially, always wants at least one product cycle to accomplish any regulatory change that involves the structure of a vehicle.
The same desire not to crush the industry with regulatory demands in the middle of a financial crisis led the NHTSA to delay until 2011 from 2010 the launch of its new more-rigorous crash tests. But the 2011 model year is right around the corner, given the lead time auto makers need to redesign vehicles and conduct their own testing.
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My Take: I like this little car! It is so cute! The Fortwo is a fantastic car for single people and it is economical. Of course, you have to give up the crowd when going to a party, but it is worth it. I now if they could just make a four seater that was just as economical they would really have a car that everyone would want. Well, almost everyone.
Since it is not a gas-guzzler, people will begin to travel more. This will improve tourism around the country and help the economy. The question is, how often will it break down? If the engine, transmission and framework constructed well, it should not break down very often. This can make a difference to a single person financially.
It is like choosing a doctor or dentist, once you find a dentist that you like; you do not want to change. Even if that dentist were a cosmetic dentist, you would not want to change as long as they gave you what you wanted.
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