From: hinz@picard.med.ge.com (David Hinz Mfg 4-6987 ~BHOSVWZ#097)
Subject: Re: Mileage vs. Safety concerns in autos
Organization: GE Medical Systems, Magnetic Resonance
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 92 06:12:30 GMT

John F Nielsen (jnielsen@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu) wrote:
: In article <1992Dec30.061609.29827@mr.med.ge.com> hinz@picard.med.ge.com (David Hinz Mfg 4-6987 ~BHOSVWZ#097) writes:
: 
: 
: >What bothers me about the CAFE standards rising is that it will encourage
: >the building of even more flimsy cars than we already have.  Yeah, it's
: >a good idea to conserve petrol, I don't think that's the way to go about it.
: 
: If engineering is constant:

It's not.

If a car is designed by bean counters, it'll be junk.  If it's designed for
quality, rather than skimping every penny, it'll work.

: A light car impacting a wall would produce the same damage to
: occupants as a heavy car impacting a wall.

Lots of variables here.  Say you are riding on a 1-ton steel bar, and impact
the wall.  The forces on your body would be considerable.  Say you are on a 
1-ton, gradually crumpling (whatever), you'll come out lots better.  
: 
: IT is conceiveably possible for one in a light car to hit one in a
: heavy are and fare better if the light car was engineered better. The
: problem is the lighter the car relative to the other car, the more
: energy that is transferred to the light car.

Agreed.  It's not so much the AMOUNT of energy, but the slope of the impact, the 
acceleration
upon your body during the crash process.  Solid bar = rapid acceleration, crumple
process = gradual acceleration.
: 
: I guess my point is the following:
: It is incorrect to say that CAFE standards will encourage the building
: of flimsy cars. Since, if everyone drove these resulting 
: small cars, size is no longer an issue. Flimsy does not equal small
: it equals poorly engineered.

I disagree, for the most part here.  In an ideal world, where all manufacturers
would care enough, they would strive to find better ways to improve survivability.

Unfortunately, it's a whole lot easier just to make the car out of 24 gague metal
instead of 20 gague, or whatever, and end up with vehicles that just don't cut it.
While SOME give in a crash is desirable, you don't want it to give so much that
the passenger cabin is compromised.  Ideally, doors should still be openable.

It would be interesting to do a graph of vehicle weight vs. survivability, I
would think the correlation would be very high on the lightest cars (most 
dangerous) with things getting muddier as the cars get heavier.

: Size only matters to saftey when you have all types of cars on the
: road. In that case you would want the biggest best engineered car you
: can find.

I would say that size doesn't even matter then.  I'd rather have the best   
engineered car I can (find & afford), rather than the biggest.


: John Nielsen   MAGNUS Consultant            ______   ______   __  __	

I guess what I'm trying to say is that CAFE isn't the way to go to save energy,
if you look at the long term benefits to the society at large.  If you force
mileage figures of, say, 40MPG, you WILL be forced to buy flimsy cars, because
that's the easiest for the automakers to produce that will reach that mileage.

If we would, instead, go to multi-fuel (or just alcohol) while we are getting
the bugs out of the EV systems, we could keep some semblance of survivability
in the average car, which would carry on into EV's, hopefully.  If we cheapen
construction even more NOW, then there's no reason for the average car to 
improve once petrol isn't a concern.

Composite materials may be an option here, for better strength/weight ratios, but
I'm assuming that they are cost prohibitive at this time.  Once that technology
matures, it could be a great resource in this area.       

Until we have a way to do it safely, raising the CAFE standards drastically
is not going to help us long-term, but it'll look good for short term 
political gains.  I guess that's what it's all about when you're in charge, eh?

Later,
Dave



--

Dave Hinz  -  Opinions expressed are mine, not my employer's.  Obviously.
Ask me if I have an opinion on this! \ Don't blame me; I voted for Perot!
SAAB - Because you get what you pay for.     \       Pherrets are Phun!!!
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