Was just thinking about how necessary roll cages are in most cars today in order to really make them trully great in both cornering and safety. Indeed it seems that car manufacturers have hit a wall- actually I wouldn't want to hit a wall in most cars as they aren't stong enough to take it, in terms of the rigidity of thier chassis's.

So strange it is that one can double or even triple the torsional/lateral and all manner of other measured forms of chassis ridigity simply by adding a good roll cage. What does that say, simple it says most all steel/aluminum chassis today are relatively weak and built to a very low cost.

But then I think why couldn't it be that some aftermarket smart people, create a real roll cage for regular cars, that has much much less intruision into the cabin, as if starting with a convertable, chopping the windsheild off, and going to work building an internal roll cage without the flimsy regular A b and C pillars getting in the way - I say remake them all.

If the manufacturers don't want to truly give us exponential upgrades in chassis design, then lets do it ourselves, using their cars as a base.

I would predict that if every car on the road today was built to a very high level of ridigity with internal roll cages, that if today there are 40,000 deaths a year from car crashes such a number would be cut by 2/3rd's/66%, saving over 26,000 lives a year in europe, plus another 26,000, in America, plus many more everywhere else. Just think about how many racing accidents occur which the driver crashes at a horrible speed and lives? And all us lowly regular people who have to drive relative tin cans get to die instead. Don't believe the hype that just because new cars are safer than ever before that their actually safe! JL

 

Looking at the responce to this, one would think this was a silly idea. As such you guys can continue not to demand better safety, and continue to get just about the same basic level of safety- that is ample protection for minor shunts, and continue to drive cars that even if no driver error is involved will often kill you if you happen to be traveling fast and a mistake or malfunction of some sort occurs. As you wish, or as your apathy allows. I feel very sorry for the tens of thousands of innocent blameless drivers who die each year all around the world. Maybe this is just some silly notion I have, and I'd better keep it to myself in the future.

 

I think if you were able to see the way modern body shells were constructed you would see the comprehensive roll cages all ready fitted INSIDE the A,B.C posts and inbetween.
I worked in the car industry in the late 80's when all this was getting very busy and worked closely with the Body-in-White guys in UK and Detroit.
The cages were going in then, and are certainly there now.

The fact that people crash, get killed and injured is more due to driver education, road manners, road layout, congestion and dawdling sleepy motorists/cyclists and pedestrians.

Car design has never been this good.
The pressure on the environment to use less fuel, less materials etc pushes the designers/engineers to have lighter cars and test their imagination to new ideas.
A super strong chassis, plastic deformable outer shell etc and then the all aluminium cars such as Jaguare/AUDI all pushing the boundries of design for strength and lightness.

We should remember that a light car will be bounced all over the place on impact so subjecting the occupants to further 'dynamic' truma as the car rolls/spins and gambols everywhere to rest.

Graham

 

And more important don't forget about crumple zones. Large parts of modern car are deliberately designed to absorb energy by deforming in a controlled manner in areas apart from the passenger compartment. Bolt in a roll cage that picks up on the front suspension turrets and the roll cage can "short out" the crumple zones. Great for rigidity which helps suspension operation in normal driving but not so good in normal road accidents (if there is such a thing...).

But even with this modern cars are loads more stiff than old ones, look at the work needed to make a mkII escort into a clubmans rally car compared with a focus. Plus from what I hear the road manners of a classic compared with a current model impreza.

 

Last I checked Rally cars both WRC and Group N, seem to crash on-road (into mountains, rocks, trees, lamp-posts etc) rather harder than us regular road users, and they usually LIVE- even in very dramatic chrashs. Indeed crumple zones do work on these cars, obviously. Maybe if they fall off a cliff or hit something at 100mph they die as well, but really the saftey of those rally cars is expontionally better than what we mere consumers can get.

Really this argument that cars are getting better and better and better, is really beginning to get old. Yes they improved quite a bit, but they arn't where they NEED to be thats the point!

 

There are limits.
An Impreza like Petter's is..expensive.
An Impreza driven like Petter's is way beyond the average

An average Impreza (or any car) is built to a cost that the punter will see as value for money.
No production car mass produced to a commercial cost will ever meet 'Petter's' spec, never!

We must thank guys like Ralph Nader in the 60's for his work in the industry for where we are today, in secure cars that will tolerate huge impacts and keep the occupants 'safe' by belts/airbags/collapsing columns/brake pedals and crumple zones to cussion the person.
Just look at a classic Mini and a new Nissan Micra to see that cars are better and better.

Cost verses spec and consumer 'greed' to have more for a (lot) less.
That is what slows down progress.

Graham.

 

> Last I checked Rally cars both WRC and Group N, seem to crash on-road
> (into mountains, rocks, trees, lamp-posts etc) rather harder than us
> regular road users, and they usually LIVE-

And they all wear 3" 6 point harnesses, helmets, seriously strong carbon shell seats, HANS device. There's two of them. They sit virtually on the floor in the middle of the car.

Your average road punter isn't prepared to be strapped immovably into a seat, wearing a helmet and a hans device. And of course there's got to be room for four of them.

So it's horses for courses. What's good for a rally car isn't for a road car. If it was as easy as you make out then don't you think the manufacturers would do it? After all making cars safer sells, look at Volvo.

 

Another thing not mentioned here is alot of chassis components are spot welded.
Seam welding all joins greatly increases the rigidity. But as mentioned above can affect the deformation of the shell.

Bottom line is...don't crash! Expect the unexpected because s**t can and does happen. Driving like a WRC wannabe will also make it more likely to happen