If two 70s cars collided, all the energy is transferred to your body since the solid construction of the car wouldn’t dissipate much of it.
Yes, the 70’s car would “win out”. Its driver, on the other hand would fare much worse than you.
Ideally, people wouldn’t treat possibly fatal transit collisions as a sports game. And also ideally, most people would see the uselessness of looking at which car is less damaged. Realistically, I know neither of those are universal, but I do hope they are common.
Yup. Any impacted component that survives means that the force was transferred to the driver instead.
Modern cars look worse after a collision for a reason: If it collapses/crumples, it means that it absorbed some of the forces applied to it.
The amount of energy absorbed by the cars is the same for both drivers. (What makes that car existence a risk to both parties.)
The problem of the old car is that it transmits the extra force to the people inside in some of the worst possible ways.
Have I got a video for you!
Goddamn it’s not even close. '59 car dummy got skewered. '09 car dummy landed on a soft fluffy mattress in comparison.
It’s interesting considering how the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety really highlights what is more important for them to reduce in a collision. Modern cars might sustain much more damage and be more likely to get written off as a total loss, but that will probably cost them $30-40k at the high end in most wrecks. But if a person gets seriously injured the insurance company could very quickly be on the hook for the full $100-300k in medical bills most people get coverage for.
Featured comment on the first video pretty directly answers the question from @OP @Patnou@lemmy.world :
As a Firefighter I was called to an accident which turned out to be a head on collision between 60’s model Chrysler and a 2000 model Subaru. The Chrysler looked to have held up pretty good but the driver was taken to hospital with life threatening injuries. The Subaru was totalled back to the windscreen yet the mother and daughter in the car walked away without a scratch.
Another thing to point out is the newer car is “only” a 2009 model. We’ve had another 17 years since then to make them even safer still.
It’d be interesting to see how much cars have improved since then.I love how much this one video has done to explain new car safety.
It’s honestly worth keeping the principle behind crumple zones in mind with everything:
If energy can go somewhere else, then less of it will be transferred to what matters.
For cars, the energy going into bending and breaking the materials of the crumple zone then doesn’t get transferred to the interior compartment.
For Xbox controllers, they’re designed so that when they drop, the batteries shoot out and go flying, which means less energy goes into the controller shell and internals.
And with a lot of laptops these days, you’re seeing the actual toughest, most survivable ones not be built out of heavy rigid metal and glass like Apple does, but out of light flexible aluminum composites. A) they weigh less so there’s less potential energy involved in a fall, and B) some of the energy gets transferred into bending the shell which will then snap back to form.
Nope. Its much safer to crash in a today car. 70’s would break as well and break you more. Both would be totaled anyway in such a case.
Today’s cars are designed to crumple and protect you, older cars transmit more damage to your body.
The car from the 70’s survives accidents better because more of it is rigid, but this makes it more dangerous as more of the force of the accident is transferred to the driver.
Modern crumple zones are placed intentionally so that while the car will crumple, the driver will not.
If I have to pick only one, I’m going to go with modern crumple zones
But man, I do wish we had some kind of magical smart metal that could be as rigid as an old car for low speed collisions, but still crumple for more serious impacts.
Because when you drive an old shitbox like I do, pretty much any damage is enough to total it, and having to get a new car really sucks when the accident was minor enough that no one was going to get hurt anyway.
Reverse Newtonian metal sheet. I think that’s doable in my lifetime.
Get EV. Make it do the skateboard design idea where the chassis/drive train is a skateboard under the cabin/cargo body. Delete the bolts that join the halves, replace with bungee cords. Done.
I had a toy car at some point that had plunger bumpers that reversed motor direction on impact.
In the 70s car, the steering column would impale your chest.
A LOT of people died in car accidents, with the cause of their deaths investigated, to make cars safer.Also, today’s cars are primarily metal, too (but cleverly designed to crumple and absorb the shock from the impact instead of transferring it to the squishy human inside).
A big difference is 70s car might retain its outer shape. Modern car not only intentionally crumples, but the passenger compartment is much stronger to keep all those sharp metal bits away from the soft squishy people
I saw a post where a Cybertruck got T-boned by like a Nissan or something. The Tesla didn’t look damaged badly at all and the other car was modern art. Tesla people were bragging about it until someone pointed out that the Nissan driver walked away while the driver of the Tesla broke both legs.
I know this is anecdote, but the point is that vehicle damage doesn’t prove people injuries.
Yeah, but also not a fair comparison. Whatever the safety status that Cybertruck might be, getting t-boned is always a challenge. No car has a crumple zone on the drivers side door
Crumple zones are your friend
The thing you got to understand is that the energy of the crash has to go somewhere. The same energy will apply to both cars, the modern car will absorb a lot of it by deforming, the old car won’t absorb any in that way because it’s a hard piece of metal. And you have to wonder, what is more important to you, the car chassis or the people inside? You might as well ask “why do we put packing peanuts if nails are a lot tougher” or “why do we ship eggs in weird cardboard boxes if a metal square would be more resilient”
The cylinder must remain unharmed
In the 70s the cars won but not the people. Modern vehicles let the people survive instead of themselves.
I’m surprised no one addressed this yet, but 70s cars are in limited supply, and that’s before you account for groups who would buy one given the option. Then what happens when there’s no more 70s car? Can’t exactly just get another one
Why arent people buying more cars from the 70s?
Parts and servicing is a big problem now. A lot of shops wont touch anything they cant plug a diagnostic computer into.
Some parts are made of unobtanium and require complex workarounds or paying through the nose for parts.
A lot of 70s cars were pretty damn ugly too
And have poor performance, handling, ride. Most people really wouldn’t want one
The 70s car might beat the modern car. For the people inside the vehicles, the story is quite different.
Which do you want as a crumple zone: the car or you?
In this economy? Idk man
Damn…
In the US medical costs would bankrupt you if you don’t have insurance.
Even having insurance is no guarantee.
Yeah but you can survive being half crumpled and your half crumpled car will probably still get you to your 9 to 5… Pretty good outcome!
I direct you to this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_r5UJrxcck
Tldw: cars today are designed to keep the driver safer in a crash, and by having crumple zones and such, the driver is protected more from the forces that are at play.
Edit: aw drat people beat me to the explanation as well as the video! Well shucks at least I had fun commenting lol
thank you for the question . it was interesting reading through the responses.
“70s car wins …but you still lose” lol
