5th gear airbag pictures

[mr StinKa gob]

Please note that if you are wearing a seat belt, the driver doesnt even touch the airbag if it goes off. As i have been saying for ages.

Proof that they are only effective in frontal impacts where the seat belt is not working or fastened.

Enjoy the extra weight boys, because they are such a good safety feature.

 

[Tomx]

Why would they put them in cars if they were not effective whilst wearing a seatbelt?

 

[Nik]

"Seat belts have the ability to better protect vehicle occupants from fatal accidents than anything else. In 2003, the use of seat belts saved nearly 15,000 lives nationwide, but even more lives could have been saved had occupants been properly restrained in seat belts during a crash. Nearly 21,000 lives, or an additional 6,000 lives, could have been saved had seat belt failure or improper use not been present"

Think I can live with the extra bit of weight just in case personally.

Should I decide to dispose of the airbag in the future, it wont be primarily for weight saving reasons.

 

[hyb]

not everyone travels at 30mph

 

[Luke335]

I agree with Hyb.
Maybe your head will only move a limited distance, but the steering wheel will move in a crash too! I'm happy to keep my airbag just in case. Have you seen what a steering wheel does to cheekbones, jaw, teeth etc. Its not pretty.

 

[mr StinKa gob]

Airbags were invented in Britain, but used in America, where in some states it was not a requirement to wear a seat belt, so they fitted airbags to cars to save lives. With no seatbelt fitted, they do save lives.

However, if your seatbelt is working, in the event of an accident the seatbelt will not allow yuor head to reach the airbag (unless you sit too close to the steering wheel). If you are going so fast that the column gets propelled into your face, you will probably die, airbag or no airbag.

They are fitted because stupid people think they make cars safer. And manufacturers have to give people what they want to make money. You think people actually care if you live or die in a crash? They just want your money, and with most people the scam works.

Side impact bags do protect drivers.

 

[Luke335]

I've seen the consequences of a head against steering wheel impact. It was a head on collision,wearing a seatbelt in a peugeut 309. The guy was fine apart from the extensive surgery to rebuild his face. I don't think he would agree.

I do agree that occupant / pedestrian safety is something that can feel like a burden to manufacturers! However, I disagree with your view that they don't care, even if it is partly because it makes financial sense!

 

[Luke335]

If you are going so fast that the column gets propelled into your face, you will probably die, airbag or no airbag.

So are you saying you would rather just headbutt the column, because you'll "probably" die anyway! I think i'd take the airbag option! :wink:

 

[mr StinKa gob]

The steering colum will crumple in an accident. Thats whats its designed to do. If it is such a hard impact that even despite the column crumpling, it still travels far enough back to smack into my face then im pretty sure ill be dead anyway as the front of the car will be completely destroyed and the engine will probably crush my legs and my spine will be broken from the seat belt.

 

[Luke335]

Maybe, but not in my experience.

Drive carefully, lets not try and find out!

 

[matt the cat]

Take it your car aint got one then king stroppy?

I had an horrendous crash in my beloved 3 door cossie approx 10 years ago - no airbag and seatbelt working fine. My head hit the wheel and slit open just under my eye.

An aibag would have stopped my head injury.

I can see your point from the top gear program, but it was at 30 MPH and the guy was bracing himself. I dont agree with the scam theory stated though.

 

[Nik]

The fatality risk of front-seat occupants of passenger cars and light trucks equipped with air bags is compared to the corresponding risk in similar vehicles without air bags, based on statistical analyses of Fatal Accident Reporting System (FARS) data from 1986 through early 1996.

The principal conclusion is that driver air bags save lives. The fatality reduction benefit of air bags for all drivers is an estimated 11 percent; this percentage is essentially unchanged from 1992 and 1994 analyses by NHTSA staff.

New, positive findings are that driver air bags save lives in light trucks and in small cars, that passenger air bags save lives of right-front passengers age 13 or older, and that driver air bags provide a significant supplemental life-saving benefit for the driver who buckles up (as well as saving lives of unbelted drivers). On the other hand, preliminary analyses of limited accident data show a higher fatality risk for child passengers age 0-12 in cars with current dual air bags than in cars without a passenger air bag. Also, current air bags may have diminished, or even negligible benefits for drivers age 70 or older, and they do not have a statistically significant effect for drivers of any age group in oblique-frontal crashes.

The main findings and conclusions of the evaluation are the following:

AIR BAGS SAVE LIVES

* If no passenger cars or light trucks had been equipped with driver or passenger air bags, it is estimated that a total of 1136 additional fatalities would have occurred during 1986-95 (approximate confidence bounds: 692 to 1622).

OVERALL FATALITY REDUCTION - DRIVER AIR BAGS - PASSENGER CARS

* Air bags reduce the overall fatality risk of car drivers by a statistically significant 11 percent (confidence bounds: 7 to 15 percent). In other words, a fleet of cars equipped with air bags will have 11 percent fewer driver fatalities, total, than the same cars would have had if they did not have air bags.

Point disproven.

Alive thanks to a seat belt yes, but some people are alive thanks to an air bag and would be dead had they not had one in addition to a seat belt.

 

[mr StinKa gob]

LOL @ confidence bounds. That this means the deaths prevented are an estimate based on a small popluation sample.(ie they studied 10 accidents, accertained that an air bag would have saved 3 lives, then extraploated that to all the accidents in the country using a normal curve model).

This is very unreliable. Might as well go and piss in the wind and pull a figure out of a hat.

Its open to bias from a number of sources, least which is the accidents you choise to include in the sample. Basically you can make the statistic show whatever you want, its not double blind, and so is meanigless.

Also they are saying that only 80 % of the time is the actualy sample between their predetermined estimate of 1136 lives saved. This is pretty poor. Most rigerous scientific estimates would have to have confidence of 95 - 99% to be claimed to be solid.

 

[hyb]

well I guess we should go chuck our airbags out now that stromba's cleared that one up.

 

[Tomx]

If The Williams had one it would be the best thing since sliced bread. Do you are saying you are right and the people who test them are wrong, the world would be a safer place without airbags.

 

[Nik]

I understand what Stromba is trying to say, but the fact is that in some cases either in higher speed impacts or due to seatbelt failure / improper use, airbags do save lives. If its only as a backup in the very small chance that the seatbelt fails i'm quite happy to have an extra few kilos of weight to have it.

 

[mr StinKa gob]

And when 'reports' claim reductions of a percentage (in this case an 11% reduction from having an airbag fitted) they are talking relative numbers not absolute numbers.

eg.

In the treatment group (air bag fitted) 7.6 percent died in accidents

In the control group (no air bag fitted) 8.5 percent died in accidents

7.6 is 89% of 8.5 ie a RELATIVE 11% reduction

However that ACTUAL reduction is a measly 0.9 % (8.5% - 7.6% = 0.9%)


So in ACTUAL terms if you crash with an airbag your chance of dyning is 91.5 %
If you crash without an airbag your chance of dying is 92.4%

Then if you randomly went down the road and selected the first 100 cars you came across with airbags and noted the model. Then did the same with car not fitted with an airbag. The chances are that the 100 non airbag cars would be generally older, smaller, less safe generally and probably have less able brakes and tyres (on account of being older). The 100 cars selected with airbags would tend to be higher spec, have better brakes, be newer, and bigger. So are you actually measuring air bag effectiveness or are you actually saying that:

Cars fitted with airbags tend to be safer than cars not fitted with airbags because they are bigger, higher spec, more modern, and generally safer models?

Unless you control for this bias by only measuring accidents in identical cars in identical accidents (the olny difference being one car had airbag, the other didnt) then you have so much bias the figures are meaningless.

That my friends is a lesson in the dark art of statistics. :wink:

Have a nice day.

Give me some figures and i can make any statement you want from them. You just have to know how to massage the maths.

 

[mr StinKa gob]

If The Williams had one it would be the best thing since sliced bread. Do you are saying you are right and the people who test them are wrong, the world would be a safer place without airbags.

No what im saying is that i am an independent scientist trained in statistics and i could rip a hole in their argument so fast that they would not have time to deploy and airbag to save themselves

I have no vested interest in selling airbags. The companies that make airbags do. Make up your own mind who is more likely tobe telling the truth.

 

[Nik]

i could rip a hole in their argument so fast that they would not have time to deploy and airbag to save themselves

That's some quick maths! You should go on Countdown, put Vorderman to shame :wink:

 

[ryanaldo13]

Easy now tiger's

VBH said after the crash test that the airbag is only the 2nd means of saving your life in a crash.

Your seatbelt is the no 1 life protector. only in america where the fat yanks cant get a standard seatbelt around them means the airbag a must have.

I think the best use of an airbag is on the side impact because there is less crumple zones But the Trophy does'nt have it so no point in talking more about it.