Safety of S70 vs newer cars

[matthew1]

The heavy attention given to crash ratings has caused sight lines to suffer. Have you seen A-pillar thickness in new cars lately? My 2017 Golf wagon’s could substitute for a basement support column.

Gone are the days of big glass (think 1990s Volvo 90 series) and great natural/passive situational awareness.

[WhatAmIDoing]

I think active safety controls in new cars are breeding worse drivers. If you've ever watched the last few seasons of "Canada's Worst Driver," nearly all of their bad drivers claim total dependence on their cars active collision avoidance systems. Technology is no substitute for situational awareness and defensive driving.

[redc70]

Don't know how relevant this is but an interesting video nonetheless. I realize this video is 9 years old and tech has come a long way. Even though the little Renault survived better, I would kinda prefer RedC70 over it any day!

Enjoy! maybe...

[misha]

Rumour says that there was no engine in this 900 series Volvo.

[j-dawg]

It's there. You can see it.

I also agree that driver aids are not a substitute for paying attention, and that bad visibility is worse than good visibility. But there is no way you can demonstrate that older cars are safer. It's not true. We cannot operate by feelings and anecdote when the facts are available to us.

[misha]

[WhatAmIDoing]

I never made the claim that an S70 is safer than all modern cars, but I will wager that it is safer than some, Kia Sportage and Rio come to mind. The fact is, if you care about safety above all else, you are not going to buy a 20+ year old car. If you are a single mother on a budget, you can pick up a V70 in driveable condition for under $2k, and it will be much safer for your kids than many other vehicles in that price range, not to mention reliable.

As for the video, the test was sponsored by Renault, and as a scientist I always take sponsored tests with a big grain of salt. Without accelerometers on the dummies and without extraditing them, these results are fairly meaningless. Sure the Renault looks better, but would its occupants have suffered traumatic brain, neck, and internal organ injuries from the rapid deceleration. The Volvo crumpled more, so maybe the occupants were spared internal injuries. You can't see the dummies foot, but that doesn't mean a broken leg/ankle or an amputation. Scientific results matter, this was just a "oh this car looks worse so he died" test.

Misha, correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't the 850s and S/V70s a bit more robust in their frame construction vs the older 940s? Doesn't the 850 have a substantial metal beam bolted/welded to the frame on the front and rear specifically to withstand such a crash scenario? This seems absent on this particular 940, along with seat belt tensioners and airbags.

Last point, it doesn't matter what you are driving in a head on collision above 40mph (both vehicles going 40). Your chances of surviving a sudden impact diminish sharply above 60mph (to 0), and survive-ability then becomes more a matter of divine intervention than safety designs. The laws of physics are a b...bear, a very angry bear.

[j-dawg]

An even longer rant ahead. I am passionate about this subject because of how wrong the conventional wisdom about this stuff is.

(1) This video was not sponsored by Renault. The presenters say they purchased the Renault for the 4500 GBP on the used market. There's no evidence that it was sponsored besides some Youtube commenters. Youtube commenters are the single worst source of information on the internet, maybe anywhere. See final attached image for how the rest of the "Sponsored by Renault" comment thread went. You think these people have got some insider info about how the BBC funds its shows?
(2) Admittedly it's hard to tell, but [attached image] looks like an engine to me. See the two attached images - one screenshot of the video, one photo of a 940 engine bay. The engine was present in the crash.
(3) A longitudinally-mounted iron block engine is a safety hazard to anyone in the passenger compartment - it will transfer energy from the front bumper into the firewall and cause massive deformation to the floorboards, which in turn will cause foot injuries. There was an engine in the Volvo, but if there hadn't been the outcome would likely have been better for its passenger dummies.

The conspiracy theories about missing engines and rigged tests - endemic to any Youtube video about new-vs-old crash tests, or really anything unintuitive - are pure fantasy, invented to reconcile what appears to be difficult to believe: that the smaller car can actually be safer.

The point being made isn't that you should buy a used Renault Modus (to reiterate, no evidence that this was sponsored by Renault). The point is that modern auto safety technology is more effective than our intuition would lead us to believe. The video asks us to stop trying to reason our way into which car is safer based on fundamental ideas of what makes a car safe (big, lots of steel, etc). It asks us to respect the engineering that goes into modern auto safety, and how it can balance out the size and weight advantages of a bigger, older car that costs the same. That is the point.

The stats bear this out. See IIHS' data for 1997 and 2014:
97: https://www.iihs.org/media/a2b46bf9-48f ... -table.pdf
14: https://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/driver-death-rates

The '97 850 death rate is 39 (ie, 39 deaths per million registered vehicle years). The average death rate for all 2014 vehicles is 30. If you factor in some of the things stated in this thread - drivers of new Volvos are safety-minded and thus probably drive more safely, drivers were more distracted in 2014 than in 1997, etc - then the evidence becomes more stark. You can try to discredit this data or pick at nits but it is the closest thing to useful data that you will find for the discussion we are having, and it reflects the greater trend that is easily verified: overall safer cars, fewer road deaths per mile driven, etc.

I do not posit that you will be killed if you crash an S70, or that you cannot die in a Renault Modus. I say only that, as lay people, you and I have a poor understanding of what causes car crashes to be fatal. If we want to know what is safe, we should look at the data...and the data say that a P80 Volvo is, at best, mid-pack compared to today's midsize sedans. Safety-wise, it's great value for money - it's probably better than the worst cars made today - but let's stop pretending we're better off than most people around us. We're not.

I drive two cars whose platforms were introduced nearly 30 years ago because I like them. I consider the safety tradeoff worth it for the financial savings and the pleasure of driving something I like. But to think they are safer than their modern counterparts is delusional; to write off all evidence to the contrary as "rigged" or somehow misinterpreted is conspiratorial thinking that discards our basic faculties of reason. You may find flaws in the evidence I've presented, but if you have better data, I invite you to present it. It does not exist.

Make choices as you see fit, but make those choices based on data, and accept when you are making compromises. Don't wrestle with the evidence so you can believe the result you like better.

[j-dawg]

Maybe a better summary here. According to the IIHS, all else being equal, a bigger, heavier car is safer. I agree with that. The video's point is that "all else" is not at all equal between older and newer cars. A smaller, newer car is often safer than a larger, older car because of that "all else". We cannot look at two cars based on size and weight alone and declare which will be safer. Their technology and design are a much more important part of the equation.

[redc70]

Well, sorry guys, didn't mean to open a larger can of worms! Just thought the test was interesting. At least about newer cars using a bit more technology and perhaps different metals and build techniques to keep occupants safer.
I am a single unmarried male of 54 years, and usually no one rides in my cars except my aged father. So I would buy a car for different reasons than say a parent who has children. I have never bought nor will I buy a car based on whether or not it has airbags or any other safety devices or how well they do in a crash test. I buy them to drive and admire. So, it really doesn't bother me that I might not survive a crash. I DO feel safer driving my W124 or W126 because they DO feel more substantial and solid than my C70, but alas, neither of those can go topless during warmer months. (the car not me!)
I also have a 1961 Land Rover Series 2A, nothing whatsoever in there dealing with safety, why, I just installed seat belts a few years ago!