I've seen S2000s get destroyed and the only thing left was the passenger compartment and the drivers walked away. The frame on that car is so rigid and well-built that it could handle such a great amount of force and keep the drivers safe.

The mass of a car can also work against you in an accident if the vehicle is not engineered well.

I'd pit a NASCAR car(~3400lbs) against a bigger SUV any day.. That's an extreme comparison, but a valid one.

 

These remind me of the arguments against seat belts because a case can be cited where someone survived because they were thrown out of the car and the ones in the car died.

So two examples were cited in this thread to "prove" that light weight cars are safe when they have collisions with much heavier vehicles. One cited the safety of a light weight car built today vs a heavy 1960s car and the other a racing car vs a passenger car.

Unless I'm mistaken all cars manufactured today have crumple zones and most if not all have interlocking steel members built into doors to help protect against a side impact. Granted that some cars perform better in crash tests than others but all cars built today offer far better protection to its occupants than cars built as recently as a decade ago and infinitely more than those built in 1965.

Anyway this one has been beaten into the ground, and F=M*A prevails when everything else is roughly equivalent.

 

somebody google f-150 crash test. The whole cabin was compromised and destroyed the truck. It weighs what...4500 pounds? Then google mini cooper S test..that car held up very well for its size.. so i think engineering plays a role in saftey.

 

your example of the 2 cars is poor. we have no idea what happened at the accident scene. how do u even know the porsche driver was wearing their seatbelt? anything could have happened.

i agree with others... r&d and technology will ultimately define the safety factor when it comes to the car itself. weight really doesn't have a bearing. there are some materials out there that are extremely light yet have an astounding tensile strength.

here is a vid on the smart car. looks pretty safe to me for a 'light' car.

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