Smart Cars Coming to Canada and U.S.

AgniTheSane writes "Most importantly the Smart Car looks cool. It also gets 60 mpg, is four feet smaller than a Mini Cooper (you can park two in a standard parking spot), the plastic panels are easily swappable and one color all the way through (so you can't scratch the paint), the steel frame makes it safe in an accident, and you can get it with in-dash Bluetooth (and in Europe can read and write email via the car speakers and a microphone). The Smart car is coming to the US soon, and will cost as little as $12,000. You can read about it in Wired or on MSNBC, or you can go straight to ZAP who will be selling them in the US soon, or the smart car website in the UK. "

Comments

It is a safe car

[Anonymous Coward]

For all those screaming about security - this car has been specifically designed to be safe despite it's size; to achieve this, there are certain tricks involved, eg sliding the motor under the chassis in case of a crash.
It _has_ been rigourously tested.

You know, we here in Europe do make more out of less and don't need a 2 Ton SUV to have a save car.

Re:It is a safe car

[GroovBird]

Sliding the motor under the chassis in a crash is not what happens with this car since the engine is between the rear wheels. The technology you're describing is of the Mercedes A-class cars. They look similar but the Mercedes is a tad bigger and is a front engine/front wheel drive car.

I owned such a car for four years, specifically a Smart Cabrio. It feels much safer from the inside than from the outside. Even the most basic model comes standard with all the safety features: double airbags, ABS, stabilization... The room in front of you is all made up of buffer zone that folds when you crash. The distance between the wheels is so short that in any side crash at least one wheel takes a part of the punch.

It's a fun car to drive, with a direct feel but not like a go-cart. The suspension may be a bit dry but it corners well and is handles well in any situation.

Not so cool

[Lomby]

I live in Switzerland and had the possibility to test drive one of the two seats model.

Positive points:
- looks cool
- each passenger has a lot of room (really)

Negative points:
- automatic shift is very slow, it is dangerous and reduces confort (it brakes the car during the shift)
- the vertical construction implies rather hard suspensions, with reduced confort (you feel every bump in the road in your spine)
- noisy inside
- pricy

In Europe you can find lots of small cars that have a comparable MPG (or better km/l), have 4 seats and are cheaper.

To sum it up, coolness factor aside, I would not reccomend it.

Re:Not so cool

[Chilles]

volkswagen Lupo 3L.
3L means it does 100km on 3 litres of diesel. My limited knowledge of ancient measurement systems indicates that that is around 20% more efficient than a smart. It costs a bit more though.

Re:Death Trap

[BenjyD]

I'm guessing page 3 was a little too far for people to read, so I'll copy it here:

A steel frame absorbs front-end impact - no cockpit crumple. Get hit head-on, and the car collapses behind the doors near the back wheels.

So there is a crumple zone, it's just behind you

Re:bah - there is no safety argument

[bgarcia]

This has got to be the biggest bunch of B.S. I've ever read. And the moderators who modded the parent post up should be ashamed of themselves for their complete and total lack of understanding of simple physics.

Lighter = safer Everything else aside, this vehicle is safer because it's lighter...

Everything else aside, the vehicle is LESS SAFE to the occupants because it's lighter. I suppose that makes it more safe to the people in the other vehicle. When two masses hit, the lighter mass undergoes a greater change in velocity. This will be "felt" by the occupants, which means they're going to be injured easier.

Solid cage = safer Second, this little critter has a solid cage that can withstand the problem I just mentioned - its own mass. Most vehicles will crumple under their own mass at moderate speeds...

All cars have solid cages to protect the passengers. The difference is that the Smart has very little of the car that is not within this cage. Other cars are meant to crumple in an accident. Crumpling reduces the speed at which the rest of the car slows to a stop during a crash. This is so that the occupants of the car do not feel the full "smack" of going from 60mph to 0mph in a hundredth of a second. Decelerating that quickly will severely injure a person. Airbags can help, but regular cars have those as well. Advantage larger car.

Re:Delta P, Delta E

[Trurl's Machine]

The moms love the SUVs coz they feel safe - problem is, when they hit a Smart even slighly, they kill the occupant.

Not necessarily. Smart is designed with safety in mind and has pretty good crash test results. Don't forget that crash tests describe only the passive safety (can you survive when bad things happen?), while Smart excels in active safety (can you avoid the bad things to happen in the first place?). I was driving a rented one on a business trip and the thing is agile like a TIE-fighter. Unless you're asleep at the wheel, you will be able to make an evasive manoeuvre avoiding getting hitted by the SUV.

On the other hand, large SUVs are hopeless in active safety (a pick-up truck with a wagon-like interior will always remain a pick-up truck in terms of agility), they prone to rollover and the frame chassis does not add to passive safety, contrary to popular belief. Yes, the chassis will remain untouched by a minor collision, but it does not mean your spine will remain untouched as well. If someone drops you in a steel cage from a steep cliff, the cage might itself remain untouched on the bottom - but your spine probably won't. Modern cars wreck so horribly precisely because the chassis takes all the energy that would otherwise release - among other things - on your spine. It's no wonder that the safest 4x4 according to NHTSA is subaru forester. It's a car-based SUV that gets totally wrecked in a crash - but that's because the driver leaves from collision in perfectly good health. Someone has to explain this to all the SUV moms...

Re:Delta P, Delta E

[lifechooser]

The thing is, SUV's are the most unsafe vehicles out there.

For starters, an SUV is far more likely to be involved in an accident, thanks to increased stopping distances and high center of gravity and weight mean that they are hard to perform emergency manouveurs in.

Once in the accident, it's not the sudden stop that will kill you. The crumple zone in the front isn't designed to slow you gradually. The cabin deforming and crushing you is what kills.

The reason the cabin crushes is because there is a lot of weight at the opposite end of the car which needs to be decelerated. In a smart, there isn't. The engine is the only really heavy thing, and that goes under you.

Having an accident in a smart is like bouncing around in a small padded box with airbags. An accident in an suv is like being front and rear ended at the same time.