Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP' • Hacker News Board

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#11

Post by Maarten88 » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 9:45 AM UTC

petewailes wrote: post #6

At the risk of sounding cynical and jaded, is anyone remotely surprised by this? The EU has been pushing car encouraging manufacturers to work harder at car safety for longer, and more effectively than the US has. Seat belts? Volvo. Air bags? First made standard in Mercs and Porsches, at a time when Ford and GM were lobbying against being made to include them. They became optional and then standard between the mid to…

Well, the US car manufacturers must have been surprised. They commissioned the study, and must have thought they could spin the results to prove that the difference is negligible.

My guess is the real difference is even bigger than this report shows.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#12

Post by seren » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 9:48 AM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #8

I don't understand the issue here, cars sold in Europe already include many US cars obviously, and cars that sell in Europe are usually safety tested, for example by Euro NCAP. Here is a US car available in Europe, that has an excellent five star safety score in NCAP http://www.euroncap.com/en/results/jeep/cherokee/8871 Now if "research actually established that American models are much less safe when it comes to fro…

I might be wrong but it seems the point of the TTIP is to say "Ok our norms are equivalent in the US and EU, so a US car does not need to pass EuroNCAP to be sold in Europe"

Or rather we would align EuroNCAP on less demanding american norms, which would have the same result. A five star EuroNCAP post-TTIP would not be equivalent to a 5 star pre-TTIP.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#13

Post by petewailes » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 9:51 AM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #10

petewailes wrote: post #6

At the risk of sounding cynical and jaded, is anyone remotely surprised by this? The EU has been pushing car encouraging manufacturers to work harder at car safety for longer, and more effectively than the US has. Seat belts? Volvo. Air bags? First made standard in Mercs and Porsches, at a time when Ford and GM were lobbying against being made to include them. They became optional and then standard between the mid to…

> designed to require an airbag to be able to stop an adult male not wearing a seatbelt, What? To me it seems obivous that the right thing to do is have the seatbelt be part of the switch for the airbag -- no seatbelt, no detonation!

It's because the legislation originates from a time when most cars didn't have them as a legal requirement, so the assumption is that someone won't have one or be wearing it, if the car has it. That bit has never been updated.

It's exactly as insane as it sounds.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#14

Post by alkonaut » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 9:52 AM UTC

seren wrote: post #12

alkonaut wrote: post #8

I don't understand the issue here, cars sold in Europe already include many US cars obviously, and cars that sell in Europe are usually safety tested, for example by Euro NCAP. Here is a US car available in Europe, that has an excellent five star safety score in NCAP http://www.euroncap.com/en/results/jeep/cherokee/8871 Now if "research actually established that American models are much less safe when it comes to fro…

I might be wrong but it seems the point of the TTIP is to say "Ok our norms are equivalent in the US and EU, so a US car does not need to pass EuroNCAP to be sold in Europe" Or rather we would align EuroNCAP on less demanding american norms, which would have the same result. A five star EuroNCAP post-TTIP would not be equivalent to a 5 star pre-TTIP.

EuroNCAP isn't a regulatory thing, and it isn't mandatory, it's basically just publicly fundded consumer information. Even if more models are allowed to be sold because they pass new "harmoinized" (read: relaxed) safety regulations after TTIP, they won't sell unless they score high on NCAP. (Specialty models like pickups, performance cars likely not that sensitive, but regular passenger cars and SUV's definitely would sell poorly without a high NCAP score). A US manufacturer knows this.

I don't think (at least I hope) that NCAP would ever relax their testing procedures. Rather, they make it stricter every year, as they should.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#15

Post by JohnyLy » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 9:53 AM UTC

This is outrageous but not surprising at all. In my opinion, more than a car safety issue, this is a money-making issue. EU pushes car manufacturers to build safer cars but this has a high cost. European customers respond well to marketing campaigns promoting safety. Therefore, those extra safety costs have a good return on investment. In the US, car safety is not considered as important as in EU because companies don't think there will be a good ROI. Because car manufacturers don't believe is viable enough, they tried to hide this report.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#16

Post by masklinn » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 9:55 AM UTC

the-dude wrote: post #5

nomercy400 wrote: post #2

The worrying part here isn't that the cars are not safe, or that TTIP will allow certified cars from the US be sold in EU, but that the industry tries to hide it. And that there is apparently a gap between certification in the US and certification in the EU.

I think the timing is very interesting with regard to dieselgate.

Yes it's really fun all around, with EU manufacturers trying to bypass/fudge more stringent US emission regulations and US manufacturers trying to bypass/fudge more stringent EU safety regulations.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#17

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 10:01 AM UTC

petewailes wrote: post #13

alkonaut wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> designed to require an airbag to be able to stop an adult male not wearing a seatbelt, What? To me it seems obivous that the right thing to do is have the seatbelt be part of the switch for the airbag -- no seatbelt, no detonation!

It's because the legislation originates from a time when most cars didn't have them as a legal requirement, so the assumption is that someone won't have one or be wearing it, if the car has it. That bit has never been updated. It's exactly as insane as it sounds.

[deleted]

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#18

Post by celticninja » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 10:04 AM UTC

bencoder wrote: post #9

adaml_623 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please read the article again: "passengers in a typical EU model are 33 per cent safer in front-side collisions, an accident that often results in serious injury, than those in a typical US model." Less deaths and injuries if cars meet EU standards

I read that, I saw the difference. Sorry I wasn't clear in my original post. I meant: what causes the difference? Why is there such a big difference?

Quite simply US car manufacturers don't have to make their cars as safe, as a result they include bare minimum safety requirements to pass regulation and save on costs. As another poster says it also seems that they do little R&D in this area either, again probably to save costs and to be able spend money designing more inefficient trucks for single occupants.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#19

Post by junto » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 10:06 AM UTC

I wouldn't be surprised if we see lots of things like this come out over the next months.

VW has got seriously burned, but I highly doubt that they are the only ones fiddling the playing field.

More than likely, different manufacturer's (especially the big ones with lots of money) can afford to take their competitor's cars to pieces and look for areas where their competitors are cheating. They take them apart to gather engineering knowledge from competitors already.

Then they leak that information. Why?

Because if you are the only one to step in your own dog shit, then you stink and look stupid. If you make everyone step in their own dog shit, then everyone collectively stinks. If you can't avoid the smell, you learn to accept it. Somewhat like living in London in the 1600's.

Re: Car industry 'buried report revealing US car safety flaws over fears for TTIP'

#20

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 10:06 AM UTC

petewailes wrote: post #13

alkonaut wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> designed to require an airbag to be able to stop an adult male not wearing a seatbelt, What? To me it seems obivous that the right thing to do is have the seatbelt be part of the switch for the airbag -- no seatbelt, no detonation!

It's because the legislation originates from a time when most cars didn't have them as a legal requirement, so the assumption is that someone won't have one or be wearing it, if the car has it. That bit has never been updated. It's exactly as insane as it sounds.

[deleted]