mad_machine wrote: of course not.. lawyers run the company
I can only imagine the amount of lawsuits a company like GM goes through in a year. To think that a 4000 pound projectile traveling at 80+ miles per hour can be considered safe is still fascinating to me.
fast_eddie_72 wrote: It isn't Chevrolets fault. It's our fault, or the politicians or whatever. I think air bags are great. They should be available to anyone who wants them. But we shouldn't be forced to have them.
You can just disconnect them can't you?
I've only got one vehicle in the fleet with airbags, it's a '96 F-150 and I've taken the airbag out when servicing the steering.
The bag is back in and functional but I don't see why you couldn't just disconnect the bags and remove the light from the dash.
Shawn
fast_eddie_72 wrote: It isn't Chevrolets fault. It's our fault, or the politicians or whatever. I think air bags are great. They should be available to anyone who wants them. But we shouldn't be forced to have them.
I agree. Unnecessary safety requirements are why we can't have nice things like this
The situation is only getting worse with mandatory electronic stability control....
Ahem to most of what has been said to most of what has been said in this thread. If we want to buy things like the Radical and use it on the road we should be able to. This country sucks so much some times.
It's pretty simple to fix things, since we've seen such dramatic decreases in fatality rates year-to-year. You simply weigh how much fun you need to have against how many human lives you'd need to sacrifice and then roll things back X number of years to hit your target.
Late 1970's levels of safety is a bargain at 40,000 lives per year. To hit that goal you'll need to jettison some modern highway design features as well, but it shouldn't be too hard, especially since we've got so many more ways for people to drive distracted now.
There's a chance that people will still choose to buy cars with optional safety features, but given how bad people are at putting cost numbers on low-probability risks, I bet most people will opt for the dangerous car once government butts out of the business of protecting consumers. When I'm looking at used cars from the period where side airbags were optional, it always seems like the ones without outnumber the ones with SAB by a factor of 3:1 or more. Same thing with tires, it's pretty rare to find quality rubber on a used car.
to the OP:
yes, but the nanny stat [sic] will not fix the spelling in our thread titles!
Legislation = more safety equipment = more weight = lower MPG = higher dependence on foreign oil = tax breaks for domestic producers = legislation to increase mpg
Dontcha just LOVE government involvement in every damned thing?
My nanny stat is over 9000!!!!!!!!
914Driver wrote: Aren't they also deployed on rapid deceleration? What was he doing a split second before the pop?
He lifts. The drive train unloads (it's a manual), stores a fair bit of force, and then loads against the big hot sticky tires and the thunk sends a spike that looks like an impact (well...- it was an impact) into the puter. Since the motion loads were lateral it looks like a side impact to it so it deploys the curtains. Me thinks it this stuff is all pretty complicated and works pretty well if saving lives matter, and the driver just managed to put the perfectly "wrong" inputs in. Hopefully GM tunes that hole in the system out. I bet the individual engineers working on the cars/systems would be happy to fix it in future iterations and mayby fold it into firmware updates if they can. I am not seeing a nanny state conspiracy.
Hey, it's a New Camaro, which means the outward visibility was only slightly restricted by the airbag deployment anyway.
Basil Exposition wrote: Legislation = more safety equipment = more weight = lower MPG = higher dependence on foreign oil = tax breaks for domestic producers = legislation to increase mpg Dontcha just LOVE government involvement in every damned thing?
Uh, not exactly.
Legislation only requires 2 air bags. The rest are part of the safety war that the insurance companies set off on. They are the ones who are so afraid of light cars.
Insurance companies = free market- since they want to charge more money for you to have insurance, and then pay less out based on the reduced injuries.
Even the federal crash requirements are easily met, it's the 5 star rating that makes car realy heavy, which, again, are insurance complany driven.
alfadriver wrote: Even the federal crash requirements are easily met, it's the 5 star rating that makes car realy heavy, which, again, are insurance complany driven.
And the insurance companies would argue that this decision is consumer-driven, because they want lower rates, and lower rates come from reducing the extent of bodily injury in a collision.
From everything that I have heard and read, automobiles are the cheapest level of body repair.
I have read it even on this forum: Do not settle an insurance claim until the worst possible medical bill has been accumulated. It seems to be a case of, when it happens to someone else, they're money-grubbing scumbags raising your insurance rates, but when it happens to me, it's the insurance company trying to screw me out of my medical bills.
The issue of "nanny-state" is to consider society's expectation of protection: Car weight, car safety, insurance companies, medical coverage, the medical industry, and government mandates must be considered as one unit. To consider any one item piecemeal is to oversimplify.
AngryCorvair wrote: to the OP: yes, but the nanny stat [sic] will not fix the spelling in our thread titles!
Sure do wish we could edit titles....
as far as disabling the side curtain airbags, the last gen 4runners had a system that would let you turn the bags off if you were going to be doing some serious wheeling where the computers might think you were rolling over, theres no other car that allows you to do that afaik.
a few years back, this happened to a guy mudding in his xterra: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gw6HUoQ2gvI
This is better than the CTS-V at the strip that launched so hard On Star detected it as a rear end impact.
alfadriver wrote:Basil Exposition wrote: Legislation = more safety equipment = more weight = lower MPG = higher dependence on foreign oil = tax breaks for domestic producers = legislation to increase mpg Dontcha just LOVE government involvement in every damned thing?Uh, not exactly. Legislation only requires 2 air bags. The rest are part of the safety war that the insurance companies set off on. They are the ones who are so afraid of light cars. Insurance companies = free market- since they want to charge more money for you to have insurance, and then pay less out based on the reduced injuries. Even the federal crash requirements are easily met, it's the 5 star rating that makes car realy heavy, which, again, are insurance complany driven.
OK, maybe the number is "not exact" but airbags are there because the government requires them. Passive restraint is certainly a nanny state concept, especially since it had to work even if people weren't smart enough to click a seat belt. Then there is TPMS for the tire-gauge-impaired. And now stability control, etc., etc. I think the point is still valid. Sure, there are lots of consumer demand things that make vehicles heavier-- power windows, leg room, etc. That doesn't mean that there isn't plenty of crap there that the government has required, as well.
In reply to Basil Exposition:
Funny how you keep blaming the "government" - who would be another term for all of us.
I'd be willing to bet that if you follow the money on all of the safety rules, it quickly leads to the insurance companies. It's all to give them lower costs and still be able to get a lot of premiums.
TPMS- lawyers. And insurance companies, to have lower payouts.
Anything that drives safety/weight can be traced pretty easily to the insurance lobby industry.
It's all for the children.
alfadriver wrote: TPMS- lawyers. And insurance companies, to have lower payouts.
Even Shakespeare knew they were up to no good
:
"The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." - Henry The Sixth, Part 2 Act 4, scene 2, 71–78
Most people don't give a damn about performance. Most people do care about safety. It is in the car companies' best interest to make their car safer than their competitors in order to outdo or not be outdone by them.
Yes, this applies to muscle cars too. Most people buying them are not genuine enthusiasts.
My S13 has NO airbags. 
My corolla and geo have no ABS. I can't wait until the datsun is done. There's a large State Farm regional office near my house....it will be fun to drive by them knowing they'd be displeased with a car that has the following features.
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