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From: ddw@cornell.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.auto
Subject: More on air bags
Message-ID: <4733@cornell.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 29-Jun-83 21:24:05 EDT
Article-I.D.: cornell.4733
Posted: Wed Jun 29 21:24:05 1983
Date-Received: Thu, 30-Jun-83 10:21:58 EDT
Lines: 46

From: ddw (David Wright)
To: net-auto

I believe that Laura Creighton is indeed wrong in thinking that seat belts
are better protection than air bags in a crash.  I went back and checked
out the relevant Consumer Reports issue (Apr 77) for what info I could
find.  Air bags have the advantage that they distribute the force of a
crash over a far larger area of your body than do seat belts, which can
cause some injury of their own in a crash, since the area in contact with
your tender carcass is relatively small.  I really don't understand the
flaming about side collisions and shoulder belts, as I don't believe that
a shoulder belt could do much for you in a side collision (or a rollover)
although a lap belt might.  Anyway, frontal collisions are the biggest
hazard and the ones air bags do the most for.

I checked the figures on air bag reliability (these were reported by the DOT
in 1977).  12,000 cars equipped with air bags drove over 400,000,000 miles.
In all this time, there were only 10 erroneous air bag ejections, and five
of these took place while the cars were being serviced, apparently due to
mechanics errors.  Of the other five, none caused the driver to lose control
of the car.  Of the vehicles in the study, about 100 were involved in serious
collisions, and in only one case (a passenger-side bag) did the bag fail to
inflate.

Costs:  the true cost of installing air bags in cars is open to question.
In 1977, DOT was estimating that it should only be about $97/car once the
things went into mass production.  GM estimated twice that much; Ford, about
three times.  How come?  Well, largely because the automakers amortized their
tooling and design costs over ONLY ONE YEAR, despite the fact that the
equipment would last longer than that.  (Ford also included the cost of a
new, and unnecessary, steering column.  Or was it Chrysler?  Well, no matter.
One of 'em did it.)

I'm no fan of Big Brother, but only about 14% of US drivers were using their
seat belts six years ago, and I believe that the percentage has dropped
since then.  Giving discounts to people who claim to always use seat belts
isn't really practical -- who's to say?  How would you prove it?  Most
importantly, why should I pay higher insurance rates because people are
stupid?  At the very least I'd like to be able to order air bags as an
option on my car and get reduced insurance rates for doing so!

                                 David Wright

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