An anonymous reader writes "ZAP'sSmart Car has officially been approved by the EPA for sale in the United States. From the article: 'It was the last major regulatory hurdle the company faced.' Finally a 60 mpg car that can go 90 mph and look cool at the same time!!"
I believe it folds up into a briefcase for you to take in to the office once you finish your drive.
______
Kratos
Call that a Smart Car...?
by
Dynamoo
·
· Score: 5, Funny
The FourTwo is OK, but I just got myself one of these babies.. a Smart Roadster Couple Brabus. Pretty much all of the fuel ecomomy and a top speed of 120mph. Sorted. Oh yes, you cant't get them in North America for at least a couple of years.. heheh:)
--
Never email donotemail@WeAreSpammers.com
Re:Call that a Smart Car...?
by
Dynamoo
·
· Score: 5, Informative
This "beer can" has a watercooled turbo, traction control, electronic stability, tiptronic six speed gearbox, cruise control and the works. One key difference between a European car and a US car is that Europeans like to go round corners.. that the Smart Roadster is easily one of the best handling cards of it's type. A small roadster isn't for everybody, but if you're looking for a Mazda MX-5/Miata size car then it's pretty good. These little roadsters aren't designed for drag racing.. they're designed to be fun!
Smart is manufactured and marketed in Europe by an unaffiliated party and made US/CA compliant by DMC.
That "unaffiliated party" is Mercedes Benz (and
hence ultimately, Daimler Chrysler). I wonder why
they don't seem to want to market it themselves,
and are relying on Zap instead. Worried about it
being a flop in the US and not wanting to damage
their reputation, perhaps?
-- "The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike." -- Delos B. McKown
Re:Not so SMART . . .
by
Dynamoo
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Actually, you'd come out of that kind of collission pretty well. The Smart's tridion safety cage is almost indestructable. I've seen this thing crash tested.. the outside of the car is the entire crumple zone, and the passengers are protected in the safety cell. No cabin instrusions, nothing. Up against a normal road car, the Smart usually comes off better.
Sure, but it looks like ZAP are distributing them in the U.S. Or maybe they just need a funkier name - what we Brits call Vauxhall cars the rest of the world call 'Opal'.
But I don't get it: Smart are DaimlerChrysler, and Chrysler's a big US name - ?
I hired one for a week
by
jcupitt65
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
For a holiday with my missus driving around Southern Germany looking at stuff. It could cruise at 80mph, there was plenty of headroom (I'm 6'4", but had several inches spare over my head), enough room for luggage, it all felt slick and solid. I did have to ensure some scoffing about my lack of manliness from German friends though:-( I calculated fuel efficiency at the end of the week and it was ~67 mpg.
On the downside because the car is rather high and narrow (think two mopeds bolted together side by side), I'm told they can be scarey in side-winds.
Survivability
by
reality-bytes
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
The Smart has actually been proven to come off very well in crashes.
There is no engine in the front of a Smart to be pushed into the passenger compartment (preventing leg injuries etc.)
A UK TV show demo'd the Smart being crashed into a solid concrete wall at 70mph. Amazingly, the tridion safety cell preserved the shape of the vehicle sufficiently that the doors would still open/close. Another bonus is the low mass and hence inertia of the Smart which means you can litterally 'bounce-off' solid objects while dissipating crash energy in a safe manner.
The Smart also features high-quality airbags to prevent neck/back injuries.
Furthermore, the Smart is pedestrian-friendly, once-again, the hapless would-be road-kill bounces off the plastic panels and there are no suspension turrets to impale them.
-- Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
In Canada, Mercedes isn't even marketing them - there's a long waiting list, without them even spending a dime on advertising.
Re:Not so SMART . . .
by
Maddog+Batty
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
On channel 5 in the UK recently they showed Smart cars being driven into various other large cars. It came off very well. To do a final test they drove a Smart into a concrete barrier at 70mph to see what would happen. The car come off fine. Both doors would open and one would even shut again.
Unfortunately, anybody in the car at the time would be dead due to internal injuries. No amount of safety cages, seat belts and air bags will stop your guts from going splat internally when decelerating from 70mph to 0 in about 1 meter.
We have one and regularly go 90 mph on the motorways here. It's fab. The only reason they don't go more than 90 is that they have a speed limiter. You can get them chipped however... http://www.smarttune.co.uk/tuning.htm
To counter the negativty...
by
mccalli
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
I can see a lot of negative comments at the moment, so I thought I'd add my own (UK-based) opinion.
I've always been an in-principle fan of these SMARTs. I haven't driven one, but I've been inside one at various motor shows and there's plenty of space for two plus shopping or weekend luggage. You're not going to go trans-America with it, but to think about in that way is missing the point.
It makes an excellent city car. There are a decent number kicking around in London, and I seem to remember seeing even more when I was Hamburg a few years ago. In the city, you don't care about 90mph, you care that you can pull out nippily, find a parking space and turn round. This is the best answer I've seen since the original Mini (or maybe the Renault Twingo - never did understand why that didn't make it to the UK).
I'm actively considering swapping a Jaguar X-Type for one. Reason? My car mainly drives me to the train station in the morning and back, and a Jag is total overkill for that. We have an S-Type also for weekend trips or serious travel...why have two cars that do the same job? Only thing holding me back at the moment is a concern about its ability to cope with bad weather.
I was given one of these as a replacement car when mine was being serviced. I took it out on the motorway round Brussels and while it's a lot like driving a hair dryer it is suprisingly comfortable. I wouldn't want to do any long motorway trips in one though, but then that really isn't what the designers intended either. I'd have preferred a manual gearbox (smart forfour is the only smart with this as an option) but that won't be an issue in the US.
One thing I noticed is nobody, and I mean absolutely nobody, can stand being overtaken by one of these.
Lanky geek fits, with space for warm beverage.
by
ear1grey
·
· Score: 5, Informative
Having owned one of these for a few years, may I suggest a few plus points, tailored for slashdotters.
0. the cup holder is large enough for a thermally efficient coffee mug.
1. the boot area is large enough for two laptop rucksacks and an overnight bag, perfect for commuting.
2. the passenger seat can be folded flat, providing enough space to easily transport both a 22" monitor and an Extended ATX case.
3. with the iMove centrepiece, you can plug your iPod into it.
4. the soft top has a remote control.
6. this lanky geek (196cm 98k) finds it spacious - more roomy than say a Ford Mondeo (IIRC called a Galaxy over the pond).
7. it can be powered down in the tiniest of spaces
-- I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
60mpg? 90mph? Old news I'm afraid
by
2$+Crack+Whore
·
· Score: 5, Informative
Here in Europe it has been possible to buy 60mpg cars that will do 90mph+ for years...I really don't see how this is a revelation. Most new hatchbacks (especially the turbodiesels) can do this. Hell my 15 year old Peugeot 205 can do 55mpg.
This is not a troll but it would be really nice when certain parts of the world realise that having a 2.5 tonne behemoth that barely can get 5mpg is just not a smart idea.
Re:roll cages with covers
by
untaken_name
·
· Score: 5, Informative
It's always hilarious to me how people never can seem to take the time to RTFA (or other links in the submission), but they take something a poster said (that this car 'bounces' in collisions) as not only proven but gospel truth. In fact, the manufacturer's site disagrees with you. It calls the entire body a 'crumple zone'; the front wheels are also crumple zones. This thing won't be bouncing more than any other car would, especially in front collisions, as the wheels are designed to crumple and absorb impact. Why is it that 40 people commented about how bouncing around in a roll cage is a bad thing, but not one of them could be troubled to find out if the car actually behaved that way? Shame on you lazy assholes. Also, the site specifically talks about how the wheelbase is too short for this car to fold in on itself in t-bone collisions. I wouldn't drive one of these because I'm not a techno-listening super dweeb. However, it does appear that they've gone far out of their way to ensure that these dorky little things are safe. hopefully they really *are* that safe, because I have a feeling I might have to bang my '83 Ford Crown Vic off one or two of 'em in the wild... you know, just to see if they bounce.
Re:90 MPH????
by
golgotha007
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
That said, parking is not a problem in one of them.
No kidding. One of the highlighs of this car is that it's as long as a normal car is wide.
Therefore, to park you can just pull straight in, putting the front end (or rear) of the car parallel to the street.
For urban parking woes, it doesn't get any better.
Re:90 MPH???? Not so bad
by
technogogo
·
· Score: 5, Informative
The main motoring TV program in the UK, Top Gear recently showed crash tests involving the SMART car, which is designed with a one piece, very strong passenger shell. The car stood up very well in these tests.
One of the tests shown was an offset head on impact with a Mercedes S-class. Can't recall the speeds, but the combined speed was high. The front of the s-class was seriously smashed in by the smart car. The front of the smart car too was a mess BUT crucially the passenger compartment of the smart was intact and the occupants would have escaped serious injury.
However, because the passenger shell of the SMART car is so strong and stiff, some tests have shown high passenger loads due to restraints. No doubt due to the small crumple zones on the vehicle.
So I guess if you hit something in a SMART, hit something with a crumple zone that you can share!
Re:90 MPH????
by
Space+Coyote
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Just wait until someone gets in a head on collision with an SUV (most of them are nearly 3 times the weight of these cars -- The driver of the SUV feels almost nothing, the accident investigators wonder what kind of car was even in the crash.
OK, here's the thing: if two SUVs hit each other head-on, everyone dies. You are arguing that a disadvantage of the SMART car is that if you get involved in a fatal car accident, you don't get te satisfaction of taking the other guy out with you?
Americans are strange.
-- ___
Cogito cogito, ergo cogito sum.
Re:90 MPH????
by
animaal
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
Unfortunately, you have a point.
People are buying SUVs to be a bit safer than the average car in a crash. So now everybody's gotta get one to stay safe.
Then some people start to drive small trucks to stay safer than the average SUV in a crash. So now everybody's gotta have one to be safe.
Where does it end? Everyone driving 18-wheelers?
Tax private use of larger vehicles. Either through petrol(gas) tax, road tax, purchase tax, take your pick!
In countries where it's more expensive to drive huge vehicles, people chosoe smaller ones. The average car is lighter, more efficient, and better for the environment. And people in smaller cars (or pedestrians) are in less danger in a crash. Just look at the cars in an average city in Europe!
Re:90 MPH????
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 5, Informative
i rented the smart 4four recently, it has 4 seats which makes it actually useful and it was no problem at all to go over 190 km/h on the autobahn.
that should be fast enough for most US drivers...
it looks weak but drives surprisingly well, it's full with electronics to keep it stable - and it really feels like it.
Just wait until someone gets in a head on collision with an SUV (most of them are nearly 3 times the weight of these cars -- The driver of the SUV feels almost nothing
Just wait until that crappy SUV gets in a head on collision with a Freightliner. Only a moron would drive anything smaller than a Freightliner. Good thing the Liebherr isn't licensed for onroad use, or we'd all have to drive one of them.
Re:90 MPH????
by
Evil+Poot+Cat
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
But then again I dont actually remember seeing a bend on a US highway.
hahahha, now that's funny!
What isn't funny, is that curves in the highway aren't necessary to require swerving, although I periodically hear about someone taking an exit ramp or turn too quickly.
IIRC, I've seen three SUVs roll...
two were Explorers, one was a Rover of some type.
all three were avoiding a collision, one was avoiding a stolen car chase.
all ended up on their tops
one rolled several times, lost its top completely, and spread bodies and toys across the dry highway.
one merely slid/spun on its top, and remained on the wet highway.
one rolled onto a concrete divider (12 inches wide?), slicing the cab in half.
Then, there was the Jeep Cherokee which exploded after a rear-end collision, immolating a family of 3, and the SUV of some type which tried to drive a 270 ramp at 50mph, and exploded in the trees. I didn't see those, but they do happen.
Re:Not so SMART . . .
by
pyat
·
· Score: 5, Informative
> Unfortunately, anybody in the car at the time > would be dead due to internal injuries. No amount > of safety cages, seat belts and air bags will stop > your guts from going splat internally when > decelerating from 70mph to 0 in about 1 meter.
Are you sure about that?
say we start at 70mph, which is u=70*1800/(60*60)=35m/s.
Assume the deceleration is uniform, then we can say v^2=u^2+2as, now say that the final velocity, v, is zero, and the displacement s is 1.0m, the acceleration a works out as a=(35**2)/(2*1.0)=612m/s^2 or about 62g
The duration of the impact will be (70*1800/3600)/612=0.06s
Table 2.6 gives tolerable x direction accelerations of 45-85G depending on whether it is +x or -x direction with times between 0.04 and 0.1s. the earlier charts give similar information.
So even if we do come to a dead (hopefully not literally!) stop from 70mph in one metre, it is very severe, but it is in the range of accelerations that can be survived. The difference between survival and death is likely to be down to the quality of the restraint system "safety cages, seat belts and air bags".
Slashdot Mirror
I believe it folds up into a briefcase for you to take in to the office once you finish your drive. ______ Kratos
The FourTwo is OK, but I just got myself one of these babies.. a Smart Roadster Couple Brabus. Pretty much all of the fuel ecomomy and a top speed of 120mph. Sorted. Oh yes, you cant't get them in North America for at least a couple of years.. heheh :)
Never email donotemail@WeAreSpammers.com
That "unaffiliated party" is Mercedes Benz (and hence ultimately, Daimler Chrysler). I wonder why they don't seem to want to market it themselves, and are relying on Zap instead. Worried about it being a flop in the US and not wanting to damage their reputation, perhaps?
"The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike." -- Delos B. McKown
Actually, you'd come out of that kind of collission pretty well. The Smart's tridion safety cage is almost indestructable. I've seen this thing crash tested.. the outside of the car is the entire crumple zone, and the passengers are protected in the safety cell. No cabin instrusions, nothing. Up against a normal road car, the Smart usually comes off better.
Never email donotemail@WeAreSpammers.com
Smart car are made by Smart
Sure, but it looks like ZAP are distributing them in the U.S. Or maybe they just need a funkier name - what we Brits call Vauxhall cars the rest of the world call 'Opal'.
But I don't get it: Smart are DaimlerChrysler, and Chrysler's a big US name - ?
On the downside because the car is rather high and narrow (think two mopeds bolted together side by side), I'm told they can be scarey in side-winds.
The Smart has actually been proven to come off very well in crashes.
There is no engine in the front of a Smart to be pushed into the passenger compartment (preventing leg injuries etc.)
A UK TV show demo'd the Smart being crashed into a solid concrete wall at 70mph. Amazingly, the tridion safety cell preserved the shape of the vehicle sufficiently that the doors would still open/close. Another bonus is the low mass and hence inertia of the Smart which means you can litterally 'bounce-off' solid objects while dissipating crash energy in a safe manner.
The Smart also features high-quality airbags to prevent neck/back injuries.
Furthermore, the Smart is pedestrian-friendly, once-again, the hapless would-be road-kill bounces off the plastic panels and there are no suspension turrets to impale them.
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
In Canada, Mercedes isn't even marketing them - there's a long waiting list, without them even spending a dime on advertising.
On channel 5 in the UK recently they showed Smart cars being driven into various other large cars. It came off very well. To do a final test they drove a Smart into a concrete barrier at 70mph to see what would happen. The car come off fine. Both doors would open and one would even shut again.
Unfortunately, anybody in the car at the time would be dead due to internal injuries. No amount of safety cages, seat belts and air bags will stop your guts from going splat internally when decelerating from 70mph to 0 in about 1 meter.
wot no sig
We have one and regularly go 90 mph on the motorways here. It's fab. The only reason they don't go more than 90 is that they have a speed limiter. You can get them chipped however...
http://www.smarttune.co.uk/tuning.htm
I've always been an in-principle fan of these SMARTs. I haven't driven one, but I've been inside one at various motor shows and there's plenty of space for two plus shopping or weekend luggage. You're not going to go trans-America with it, but to think about in that way is missing the point.
It makes an excellent city car. There are a decent number kicking around in London, and I seem to remember seeing even more when I was Hamburg a few years ago. In the city, you don't care about 90mph, you care that you can pull out nippily, find a parking space and turn round. This is the best answer I've seen since the original Mini (or maybe the Renault Twingo - never did understand why that didn't make it to the UK).
I'm actively considering swapping a Jaguar X-Type for one. Reason? My car mainly drives me to the train station in the morning and back, and a Jag is total overkill for that. We have an S-Type also for weekend trips or serious travel...why have two cars that do the same job? Only thing holding me back at the moment is a concern about its ability to cope with bad weather.
No, I'm seriously interested in these.
Cheers,
Ian
I was given one of these as a replacement car when mine was being serviced.
I took it out on the motorway round Brussels and while it's a lot like driving a hair dryer it is suprisingly comfortable.
I wouldn't want to do any long motorway trips in one though, but then that really isn't what the designers intended either.
I'd have preferred a manual gearbox (smart forfour is the only smart with this as an option) but that won't be an issue in the US.
One thing I noticed is nobody, and I mean absolutely nobody, can stand being overtaken by one of these.
Having owned one of these for a few years, may I suggest a few plus points, tailored for slashdotters.
0. the cup holder is large enough for a thermally efficient coffee mug.
1. the boot area is large enough for two laptop rucksacks and an overnight bag, perfect for commuting.
2. the passenger seat can be folded flat, providing enough space to easily transport both a 22" monitor and an Extended ATX case.
3. with the iMove centrepiece, you can plug your iPod into it.
4. the soft top has a remote control.
6. this lanky geek (196cm 98k) finds it spacious - more roomy than say a Ford Mondeo (IIRC called a Galaxy over the pond).
7. it can be powered down in the tiniest of spaces
boakes.org
Otherwise known as Daimler Benz; been making quality automobiles since 1886. So, not much track record there.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
Here in Europe it has been possible to buy 60mpg cars that will do 90mph+ for years...I really don't see how this is a revelation. Most new hatchbacks (especially the turbodiesels) can do this. Hell my 15 year old Peugeot 205 can do 55mpg.
This is not a troll but it would be really nice when certain parts of the world realise that having a 2.5 tonne behemoth that barely can get 5mpg is just not a smart idea.
It's always hilarious to me how people never can seem to take the time to RTFA (or other links in the submission), but they take something a poster said (that this car 'bounces' in collisions) as not only proven but gospel truth. In fact, the manufacturer's site disagrees with you. It calls the entire body a 'crumple zone'; the front wheels are also crumple zones. This thing won't be bouncing more than any other car would, especially in front collisions, as the wheels are designed to crumple and absorb impact. Why is it that 40 people commented about how bouncing around in a roll cage is a bad thing, but not one of them could be troubled to find out if the car actually behaved that way? Shame on you lazy assholes. Also, the site specifically talks about how the wheelbase is too short for this car to fold in on itself in t-bone collisions. I wouldn't drive one of these because I'm not a techno-listening super dweeb. However, it does appear that they've gone far out of their way to ensure that these dorky little things are safe. hopefully they really *are* that safe, because I have a feeling I might have to bang my '83 Ford Crown Vic off one or two of 'em in the wild... you know, just to see if they bounce.
http://xkcd.com/386/
That said, parking is not a problem in one of them.
No kidding. One of the highlighs of this car is that it's as long as a normal car is wide.
Therefore, to park you can just pull straight in, putting the front end (or rear) of the car parallel to the street.
For urban parking woes, it doesn't get any better.
One of the tests shown was an offset head on impact with a Mercedes S-class. Can't recall the speeds, but the combined speed was high. The front of the s-class was seriously smashed in by the smart car. The front of the smart car too was a mess BUT crucially the passenger compartment of the smart was intact and the occupants would have escaped serious injury.
However, because the passenger shell of the SMART car is so strong and stiff, some tests have shown high passenger loads due to restraints. No doubt due to the small crumple zones on the vehicle.
So I guess if you hit something in a SMART, hit something with a crumple zone that you can share!
Just wait until someone gets in a head on collision with an SUV (most of them are nearly 3 times the weight of these cars -- The driver of the SUV feels almost nothing, the accident investigators wonder what kind of car was even in the crash. OK, here's the thing: if two SUVs hit each other head-on, everyone dies. You are arguing that a disadvantage of the SMART car is that if you get involved in a fatal car accident, you don't get te satisfaction of taking the other guy out with you? Americans are strange.
___
Cogito cogito, ergo cogito sum.
Unfortunately, you have a point.
People are buying SUVs to be a bit safer than the average car in a crash. So now everybody's gotta get one to stay safe.
Then some people start to drive small trucks to stay safer than the average SUV in a crash. So now everybody's gotta have one to be safe.
Where does it end? Everyone driving 18-wheelers?
Tax private use of larger vehicles. Either through petrol(gas) tax, road tax, purchase tax, take your pick!
In countries where it's more expensive to drive huge vehicles, people chosoe smaller ones. The average car is lighter, more efficient, and better for the environment. And people in smaller cars (or pedestrians) are in less danger in a crash. Just look at the cars in an average city in Europe!
it has 4 seats which makes it actually useful and it was no problem at all to go over 190 km/h on the autobahn.
that should be fast enough for most US drivers
it looks weak but drives surprisingly well, it's full with electronics to keep it stable - and it really feels like it.
Just wait until someone gets in a head on collision with an SUV (most of them are nearly 3 times the weight of these cars -- The driver of the SUV feels almost nothing
Just wait until that crappy SUV gets in a head on collision with a Freightliner. Only a moron would drive anything smaller than a Freightliner. Good thing the Liebherr isn't licensed for onroad use, or we'd all have to drive one of them.
hahahha, now that's funny!
What isn't funny, is that curves in the highway aren't necessary to require swerving, although I periodically hear about someone taking an exit ramp or turn too quickly.
IIRC, I've seen three SUVs roll...
Then, there was the Jeep Cherokee which exploded after a rear-end collision, immolating a family of 3, and the SUV of some type which tried to drive a 270 ramp at 50mph, and exploded in the trees. I didn't see those, but they do happen.
> Unfortunately, anybody in the car at the time
o n.html
> would be dead due to internal injuries. No amount
> of safety cages, seat belts and air bags will stop
> your guts from going splat internally when
> decelerating from 70mph to 0 in about 1 meter.
Are you sure about that?
say we start at 70mph, which is u=70*1800/(60*60)=35m/s.
Assume the deceleration is uniform, then we can say
v^2=u^2+2as,
now say that the final velocity, v, is zero, and the displacement s is 1.0m, the acceleration a works out as
a=(35**2)/(2*1.0)=612m/s^2
or about 62g
The duration of the impact will be
(70*1800/3600)/612=0.06s
Now, to judge how deadly this is, we look at some data:
http://www.vnh.org/FSManual/02/03ImpactAccelerati
Table 2.6 gives tolerable x direction accelerations of 45-85G depending on whether it is +x or -x direction with times between 0.04 and 0.1s. the earlier charts give similar information.
So even if we do come to a dead (hopefully not literally!) stop from 70mph in one metre, it is very severe, but it is in the range of accelerations that can be survived. The difference between survival and death is likely to be down to the quality of the restraint system "safety cages, seat belts and air bags".