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NHTSA Gives the Model S Best Safety Rating of Any Car In History
cartechboy writes "Even crashing into a wall is good news nowadays for Tesla Motors. Independent testing by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has awarded the company a 5-star safety rating, not just overall, but in every subcategory. While its five-star score across the board has been attained by other vehicles (around one percent of all cars tested are capable of such a score) its ratings in individual categories are higher than any other vehicle, including larger SUVs and minivans. What's really interesting is that part of the safety rating may be because the car is electric."
Five star safety rating across the board. Excellent! Now if only it didn't come with a five star price tag
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Or you could read the article and see that in the areas considered for the tests, many of the common safety tests wouldn't even work, they couldn't roll the car over with standard techniques, they couldn't crush the passenger compartment with a standard crusher, and they had a HUGE crumple zone.
Do you have any evidence whatsoever that the score is undeserved?
In this case being electric helped with not having to turn off the ignition to prevent fire, have more flexibility in the positioning of elements so that more protection is added for the passenger and having so low a center of mass that they had to design a special test in order to make the car rollover since it would not do it in the normal one. Also, using spaceworthy components helped, I guess...
However, at a price point of $80 - 100K, it's going to remain a playtoy for people with money, not become the OMG super-car replacement for mom's $30K Volvo.
True, but it is the norm for the expensive, novel safety features of today's luxury cars to become standard on econoboxes a few years down the road. Airbags (front, then side), antilock brakes, traction control, etc. have all migrated down the market. You can bet that - particularly among carmakers whose reputations rely on safety as a marketing tool, like Volvo - there will be engineers very closely scrutinizing this car for design features that can be adapted or stolen.
More important, some of the safety benefits are pretty much inherent to the electric design. Not needing to allow for a big, solid metal engine block means that the front crumple zone can be engineered more effectively. Having heavy battery packs under the floor of the vehicle makes rollovers much more difficult. These types of benefits will be accessible to any electric design, not just the $80,000 ones.
~Idarubicin
Or you could read the article and see that in the areas considered for the tests, many of the common safety tests wouldn't even work, they couldn't roll the car over with standard techniques, they couldn't crush the passenger compartment with a standard crusher, and they had a HUGE crumple zone.
Also, for the roof crush test the crushing machine broke before the roof did.
The Tesla Model S is an extremely well-engineered machine. It's expensive, yes, but in most respects it's simply superior to equivalently-priced luxury cars. I'm really looking forward to their next generation, which is intended to be priced more mid-market (probably in the 30s).
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The Model S is a really heavy car, actually, almost the weight of the Ford F-150. Only a Hummer or another such extremely rare car weights significantly more. I think that speaks more for how dangerous Hummers are on the roads than how "unsafe" the Model S is. Regardless, though, the Model S is safer than any other car in its category, which is the metric that actually matters. If you're shopping for a sedan, you don't give a shit if a semi is going to give you better survival rates in a collision.
Also, don't expect safety in any vehicle above 60mph. Drive safely instead of relying on technical means to buffer a crash.
Not artificially high? How come North American cars don't have amber turn signals then?
They are amber, you just can't tell because nobody uses them. They just give you a gentle nudge to tell you they are changing lanes.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
I make a bit over $100K and live in Silicon Valley yet I had no problem affording this car, in part due to careful money management and paying off my house early and not living beyond my means. I have met a number of other owners, and not all of them are super wealthy. One of my coworkers bought one as well. For years I poured every extra cent into paying down my mortgage since it started at over 7%. Of course it also helps that I bought before the dot com boom. I financed a majority of the car, but less than many people in order to keep investing my money.
By financing I took some of the money that I didn't spend on the loan and bought some Tesla stock when it was at $35. It's the best investment I've made. I just wish I bought more stock when I did.
I met many people at the Teslive convention a month ago. Many of the Tesla owners are not what I would consider super wealthy. Many are retired. In fact, a breakdown of what people drove before the Model S was rather interesting. Many did not drive luxury cars. My previous car was a 2006 Prius which is sitting in my driveway and hasn't been driven in two months. I'll probably sell it.
Yes, the Tesla is an expensive car. In my case, it's my midlife crisis car.
Tesla has repeatedly said that they plan to come out with a car in the $30-40K range. Their biggest problem is batteries. During the last earnings report they stated that there is simply no way to get the volume of batteries they need. They need to ramp up the production facilities and their suppliers before they can hope to meet the demand. In order to meet the demand for the lower priced car they would need to manufacture more 18650 lithium batteries than are made for all laptops combined. While there is no shortage of lithium, they need to build up production.
As it is, right now Tesla is limited in the number of cars they can sell by their suppliers. They're supply limited, not demand limited.
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I would be wary of the NHTSA front crash test ratings for the Tesla. The NHTSA front crash test is a full frontal crash into a wall at 35, while the IIHS does a more real world scenario of 25% and 40% of the bumper hitting a wall at 40mph. Without a large motor in the way Tesla is able to use the whole front compartment as a crumple zone as opposed to most combustion vehicles that primary use the sides as a crumple zone. While I don't think the ratings were manipulated they are artificially high because the Tesla design is able to game the system. Unfortunately the IIHS crash test ratings have not been released yet but I can't imagine them doing as well, in the 40% test the Tesla will have lost 60% of it crumple zone while typical combustion engines will lost a little over 50%, in the 25% test Tesla will lose 75% and the combustion engine is still at a little over 50%.
Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
What I'm afraid is that there will no longer be explosions when a car barely collides in movies [U+2e2e]
[Unless it is a documentary about 'accidents' like Michael Hastings'...]
Don't worry, movie producers will rig the cars with Tesla Coils and there will be an impressive array of electrical discharge arcs emanating from the car, incinerating everything in the vicinity.
I'm no car safety engineer, but I suspect that's nonsense. If I understand modern car cabin safety engineering correctly, the whole point is to make the cabin itself very rigid, but it is surrounded by energy-absorbing crumple zones outside of it to absorb impacts. That's accomplished by having the front, end, and sides of the cars deformable. By contrast it's not exactly normal for roofs (or for that matter, the bottom of a car) to be subjected to head-on collisions. Typically roofs need to support the weight of a car if it flips over, and in that case roof deformation is *not* desirable because any reduction in the size of the cabin would lead to compression of the passengers.
Without a large motor in the way Tesla is able to use the whole front compartment as a crumple zone as opposed to most combustion vehicles that primary use the sides as a crumple zone. While I don't think the ratings were manipulated they are artificially high because the Tesla design is able to game the system.
Explain to me exactly how having an enormous crumple zone in front of the driver is somehow a bad thing. Would you rather have an engine pushed into your lap from a frontal collision? Their is no evidence I've seen that their ratings are "artificially high". The results are what they are.
If the color of turn signals is the main plank of your safety argument, you've failed.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
im not sure i would call taking advantage of engine placement choice "gaming the system". that makes it sound like cheating, which it isnt. its simply smart engineering.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
While I don't think the ratings were manipulated they are artificially high because the Tesla design is able to game the system.
Designing the car with safety in mind is not "gaming the system". The ratings are not "artificially high", they are "actually high". Obviously safety was a major design concern for Tesla, and this is the result. There is nothing artificial nor "cheating" about it. They specifically designed the car with a huge front crumple zone.
Saying that Tesla's ratings are artificially high is about the same as saying a combustion engine car has artificially low ratings because of a huge engine block in the front that does not crumple. The ratings are not artificial, they are what they are because of how the car is designed.
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I wish I'd bought then, because that stock is now around $140 per share, and climbing.
Anyone else wondering how many Romney nabbed?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Numbers!
Tesls S: 4647
Base 4x2 F150:4685
base 4x4 F150 5000
The 5th Gen Camero weight about 3700
BWM 5 series 3700.
The ford focus 2960 pounds
Just for some idea of how much cars weigh.
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