With the rise in concern regarding safety of the passengers, making a car safe in maximum aspects is the need of the hour. Numerous cars are available in the market with various safety ratings, let us now try to make it clear for our audience as what are methods which are deployed in crash testing of cars and how to look into these ratings.
Global New Car Assessment Program – Global NCAP
Started by Towards Zero Foundation a UK based organization for testing of cars safety performance under crash situation.
It has different testing procedures based upon the regulatory requirements of different countries. For example- Australian NCAP, EURO NCAP, ASEAN NCAP etc.
Methods of Crash Testing of Cars
The type of test done on cars varies from country to country. It completely depends upon different regulatory requirements in the region. Here I would like to mention how the NCAP testers arrive at a given rating for any cars.
Rating of any car is based upon the safety of its passengers which are classified as Adult occupants and child occupants. Apart from this pedestrian safety and the safe driving assisting features are kept in mind before arriving at any conclusions. Again every car may not rated based above all these aspects, it mainly depends upon under which ANCAP testing method it is rated upon.
EUROANCAP TESTING PROCEDURE
- Frontal impact with moving barrier
This test is basically done to determine the affect of the impact upon head-on collision with a moving car. The is tested at a speed of 50kmph crashed with 50 percent offset with barrier attached on another vehicle.
- Full width rigid barrier
In this type of crash testing method a car is collided with a rigid barrier at an speed of 50kmph. It is done basically to determine the rigidity of the car structure. It is also helpful to decide the level of impact on lower leg and head injuries hence thereby evaluating the safety level of the passengers in the car.
- Lateral impact-Hitting at Car sideways
In this testing mechanism a deformable barrier is attached in the front of a trolley which hits the car at a speed of 60kmph in the side portion at 90 degrees. This test basically determines the strength of the side pillars of the cars as there is no space in the car interior to absorb the impact as compared to the frontal one which results in severe injuries to the passengers.
- Side pole test
In this test, a car running at a speed of 32kmph is made to collide laterally into a pole in order to determine the impact on the passengers and to determine the level of penetration of the pole into body of car.
This is one of the most severe type of accident as the severity of injuries increases due to the collison among passengers and chances of pole hitting the passenger increases.
- Whiplash
This involves a sudden backwards jerks resulting from a slow speed rear-end collisions. Although the immediate impact may not be so harsh, it results in distortion in the spine which is difficult to treat and takes long time to heal.
This test is mainly done on the seat of the car other than the car itself in previous cases because the ergonomics of the seat can prevent such injury to a large extent.
How to prevent whiplash injury?
The most common question that how one can prevent whiplash injury? The answer to it lies in adjusting the seating position. Make sure the seats are not inclined too much so that the distance between headrest and head is more. Also adjust the headrest height so that is becomes parallel with head. This prevents excessive distortion in the spine as the headrest provide immediate support to the head thereby avoiding any stretching in the spine.
- Rescue Operation
It involves how easily a passenger is rescued from a car after crash occurs. Mechanism such auto door unlock after crash, amount of force required to open the door or unlatch the seatbelt etc comes into play.
These are the overall crash testing method in EURONCAP. Currently for Indian cars Global NCAP testing is done which may not involve every test mentioned above but the most basic testing of Frontal Impact Crash Testing is done. This itself is enough to give you an idea of the safety level of the car structure. In simple words one must check the ratings of adult occupant and child occupant to understand the ratings more accurately.
Keep in mind that safe and responsible driving is always the best option to choose, no matter how much safe your car is.
Signing Off
Md Afzal Ansari
Ride Safe, Ride Long!
[…] Recently Global NCAP has released the crash test rating of some of the highest-selling cars in India that includes the Maruti Suzuki Swift, Ignis, S-press, and Mahindra Scorpio N. To the utter astonishment of the masses, the best offering from the Maruti Suzuki came with abysmal safety ratings and the Mahindra Scorpio N scored the highest rating. To know exactly how these tests are performed by Global NCAP read this Crash Testing of Cars Explained. […]