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

Re:Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

Big European familes seem to be able to cope with http://vauxhall.co.uk/showroom/search/brand.jhtml? brand=Zafira&vehicleType=Carsub compact people carriers like these which can seat 7. Is the averge american family that large or is it more to do with status really?

Re:Looks cool??

[BenjyD]

The American 'aesthetic' sense rears its ugly head again.

Re:Safe in an accident?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget that this car was originaly developped for the european market. In europe safety in a car is regarded as very important.

In the brussels car fair they did the test by driving the SMART car against a concrete wall at 60 kmph, the doors opened without problems and the passenger-cage was perfectly intact.

ps.:My girlfriend drives a smart. It's the perfect car for women; you don't need to be able to parrallel park as you can just drive into a parking spot under a 90 angle :)

Re:Style issues

[CreationLtd]

Here in Madrid, Spain there are masses of Smart Cars. It is definitely a success here especially due to the appalling parking problem. There is so much double parking that the sound of someone honking their horn trying to get their car free is a hourly occurrence.

Smart Cars are so short they can park nose in parking spaces that aren't wide enough for a Hummer to park laterally.

As for style, my wife squeaked in delight for months on seeing them and often wanted no more than to "hug" them. They've even turned into small art and advertising billboards in the case of rental and corporate vehicles.

They're definitely a cool car by most Spaniards' measurements.

Re:Take it from a European...

[tomhudson]

It looks like a goofy chick car to me. I'd never be caught driving one.

The original Beetle was a "goofy-looking car", and it sold more than any other vehicle in the world.

Also, you might want to check out this: http://www.insidercarsecrets.com/women.html

Here's an important little tidbit for you: Did you know that in almost 80% of the cases where married couples buy a new or used vehicle that it is the woman who calls the shots and makes the final decision? It's true!
<p>
Women in particular are distrustful of car salespeople...especially used car salespeople!

Or the stats a bit further down the page:

here are some very interesting statistics pertaining to women:

*Women make up 51% of the population.
*Almost half the adult female population is unmarried.
*About 57% of single women are homeowners.
*64 million adult women work outside the home, and 19% of them earn more than $30,000 a year. About 6.5% of them earn more than $50,000.
*Women own 38% of the businesses in the U.S. and employ 27.5 million people.
*43% of individuals with assets over $500,000 are women.
*And women outlive men by 5.4 years!

So it's a "chick car". So what? That's what people said about the new Mini - but I see guys snapping them up, and their girlfriends love 'em.

A woman isn't going to get all gushy over you 'cause you have a 454 under the hood. She'll just think you're another one of those "horsepower substitutes for penis" idiots.

Re:Delta P, Delta E

[Andy_R]

(disclaimer, I just Swapped my For2-shape Smart for a Smart Roadster) The Smart is actually one of the safest small cars there is thanks to the stridion safety cage, ands also since you can't t-bone one between the wheels in anything wide than a motorbike, due to the short wheelbase.

Smart were well aware that the car looks easy to break, so they put a LOT of effort into safety. I've seen pictures of a from end collision between a Samrt and a Mercedes E-class, the Merc was a write-off, while the Smart drove away.

Re:Delta P, Delta E

[Gordonjcp]

Actually, I've seen one that had been heavily rear-ended, in a scrapyard. The doors still opened and shut as normal, and there was no visible intrusion into the passenger area. The engine had folded under the floor as the engine support frame had twisted (just the way it's meant to). The Mondeo that hit it was sitting alongside, with an impressively bent front, and the driver's side footwell squashed. The pedals were about level with the gear lever.

Of the two, I would have certainly preferred to be in the Smart. Of course, cars tend to fare better when hit from behind, but even so, the disparity in damage caused was incredible. I always thought that Smarts looked really fragile, being used to old Citroens and Volvos (which are can run over armoured personnel carriers with barely a scratch), but this was impressively strong.

They still look like they'd flip up and lie on their tailgates, though.

Re:Delta P, Delta E

[jeremyp]

The Smart car has a Euro NCAP rating of 3, which is not good by modern standards.

Re:bah - there is no safety argument

[debrain]

Lighter is safer. Ask any traffic engineer.

Reduce braking distance
Having done any research into vehicle safety would reveal this (though, admittedly, I didn't mention it, presuming that anyone with a iota of physics background would take this for granted): Even though you can't reduce reaction time, the next most important factor in traffic safety is braking distance, which is directly proportional to mass. You stop faster with less weight.

Accident avoidance
After that, I understand the next most important safety factor is avoidance, a function of lateral traction, proportional to tire width, gumminess, and closeness of the axels, and inversely proportional to mass. The less your mass, the more lateral traction. If you can avoid or stop before the accident, the odds of a detrimental accident decrease.

Functions of time
So, as you say, "it's not the speed that kills you, it's the sudden stop", the Smart Car simply slows faster prior to the sudden stop, so when that sudden stop happens, you're going much slower. Safety as a human function is directly proportional to the time of the stages in an accident: realization, reaction, braking or avoidance, and impact. More effective braking and avoidance make your time more useful.

Crumple zones
Albeit, in a smaller vehicle, there is a small but substantial increase in the potentially vital impact component. However, if you put a 730kg (1600lb) vehicle (the Smart car) against an average vehicle sized sedan at 1500kg (3300lb), the sedan will simply stop further away from the point where the driver realized and acted on an emergency situation. That distance translates into not just fewer accidents, but lower speed at the point of impact, hence less force involved in the impact, and hence fewer and less severe injuries.

Emperical questions
To measure the safety, you have to look at the merits of the differences between this vehicle and others. These merits are not necessarily obvious, involving at least:
* How do most accidents happen?
* How do most injuries happen? I believe the vast majority of accidents are rear-enders, which can be substantially reduced with better breaking distance and avoidance.
* How many vehicle accidents are related to inadequate lateral traction?
* Does the increase in avoidance and braking capacity result in fewer accidents?
* Lower the cost insurance?
* Lower fatalities? Of the owners? Of SUV drivers?
* Result in fewer fender-benders?
* How many are head-on collisions? (The only case where this vehicle would seem to be substantially less safe, isn't it? This is the case where momentum clashes and your body velocity goes from +X to -X)

Geneology of Driving
These are sort of anecdotal arguments that I've bought into: Humans aren't designed to acquire and react to information at speeds provided for by vehicles, though we have compensated very well. Two factors remain very good at making drivers more comfortable, and hence more adequate: visibility and fit. The more visiblity you have, the less compensation your brain has to do to make up for blind spots. The better you feel you have control of the vehicle, ie. how it 'fits' you, the less time your brain spend compensating for unresponsive or poorly responsive mechanics. However, a large car can have both of these. There is also a question of security; insecure drivers, ie. those in a smart car who are uncomfortable being surrounded by SUV's, may react poorly (or perhaps drive more cautiously; who's to say).

I hope that clarifies the reality and reveals to you how physics of lighter vehicles can, and typically emperically does, make them inherently safer. Bear in mind, the old Volvo tank model of safety has its merits, too. But the Smart Car is not a death trap, unlike nearly all SUV's (save the Subaru Forrester, in the USA, iirc).

Re:Delta P, Delta E

[NtroP]

I've seen pictures of a from end collision between a Samrt and a Mercedes E-class, the Merc was a write-off, while the Smart drove away.

They want $1,200.00 EACH for the headlights on my mercedes, another $1,200.00 for the 6 CD changer in the trunk, etc. It doesn't take very many pieces to need replacing in an accident before "total write-off" is much cheaper :-)

All the same, in an accident where I need to walk away, I'll take my Mercedes or my old Volvo before I'd take some of the cheap, tinfoil crap I see on the road every day (not saying the the Smart is one). On top of that, at the price I paid for my car, I'm much more careful with my driving and keeping the car in top mechanical condition. Small, cheap, disposable cars tend to be more dangerous simply from the standpoint that their owners may not have the same "investment" in keeping it in one piece.

Also, having a rigid frame around the driver is a great idea IF there is something sacrificial around it to absorb the impact energy in an accident. I can build a car that's strong enough to withstand an impact and drive away, but you'd have to scrape the occupants out with a paper towel. I have some experience in this. I built an ultra-light aircraft for my wife and decided to make is extra strong. When she crashed it (pilot error), it took almost nothing to put the ultra-light back in the air. My wife, on the other hand, was almost killed and spent 2 years with countless surgeries recovering. The investigation concluded that had the aircraft structure been weaker and able to absorb the impact, she might have been able to walk away. Needless to say, I don't fly that one any more.

On the other side of the equation, I was filming from the back seat of an ultra-light for an instructional video when we augured in (yep, camera rolling - great footage!). There was nothing left of the plane. It practically disintegrated around us, but we both walked away. The pilot broke a bone in his hand and the restraint system left some really impressive bruises on me, but we were able to spend the night out and wait for rescue just fine. The aircraft I fly now is designed to absorb the impact of a crash (I've also added a ballistic parachute to it).

Last week I was early on the scene of an accident where I thought for sure someone would be dead. One of the cars looked like no-one could have survived. However, upon closer inspection the driver's compartment was entirely intact, with several airbags deployed. The driver was standing a short distance away, talking to one of the other people one the scene. He looked shaken, but [apparently] unhurt. The other car look like it was in better condition, but the driver was still sitting in it (and was being attended to - so I didn't get any closer).

It sucks big-time to have your car looking like a grotesque piece of $50,000 modern art, but seeing your kid getting safely out: priceless!

:-)

Re:Delta P, Delta E

[NtroP]

Heh, did I mention that I went down on a commercial airliner (MD-80) back in my college days flying from Florida to Tennessee and another time I had to hike off a jungle mountainside in southern Mexico as a kid when the Cessna 185 my family was in went down. I joke to my friends that I'm the SAFEST person to fly with, after all, what are the chances it will happen again?

Seriously though, I live in Alaska now and to get to most places you have to fly in small planes. We also do a lot of hunting and fishing which you pretty much need to fly out to do effectively. There's nothing better than tossing the fly rod up into the wing of my ultra-light and landing somewhere on a gravel bar for some quiet fishing.