What are the pros and cons of plastic cars?

If anything is totalitarian, it's what you just said. Get with the times, technology has progressed.

Do you understand what a crumple zone is? When you hit a brick wall with your solid steel car, the impact is transferred straight to you. When you hit a wall with a newer cars, the car crumples absorbing the impact. That is why you see so many completely destroyed vehicles, where you can't believe the occupants survived. The cars of today are made to crumple and fold, protecting the occupants.

On one hand we have the people saying "my car" survived this and that.
These people would rather their cars not crumple of give an inch in a crash (but break the occupants necks and most likely destroy anythign they hit) as long as thier cars can survive the crash.

But the issue is not about whether your car still looks nice and shiney after going over a cliff,,,it's about what happens to the person driving it, the passengers,,and of course to the person or object it collides with if it is another car.

Most people with common sense would be more worried about lives, the chance of injury and the probability of death of you were to hit a pedestrian.

If you drivers who have these "tanks" are so happy in the knowledge that your car will win a fight with any smaller, cheaper, newer car on the road,,,,,,well my friends,,,there is always a bigger fish, remember that.

I know all about crumple zones. There's a video of a BMW roadster, slammed into a tree. It crumpled alright. The driver was crushed to death by the frame, the rest of the car (I wager was plastic) was gone, nothing left of it. Doors, sides, quarter panels. Good thing he had crumple zones in his plastic car. Too bad one of those zones was the drivers seat.

I had an old Jeep (read metal car), due to some not so wise choices, I ended up rolling it over twice, falling off a 10 foot drop and landing in 1 foot of frozen cold water. But I walked away from the jeep with nothing more than a bloody nose. Of course I didn't have crumple zone... that really sucked.

This isn't really a question. As a whole, today's cars ARE safer than cars produced only ten years ago. In the circumstance you mentioned, the driver would most likely have been killed anyway, crumple zone or not. Personally I would much rather fall off a building at 65 mph and land on a pillow. The concrete may look harder and more sturdy, but no thanks.

"Road toll figures show that car collision fatalities have declined since 1980, with most countries showing a reduction of roughly 50%. This drop appears to confirm the efficacy of safety measures introduced thereafter, assuming that driver behaviour has not changed significantly.

In the United States, fatalities have increased slightly from 40,716 in 1994 to 42,884 in 2003. However, in terms of fatalities per 100 million miles driven, the fatality rate has dropped 16% between 1995 and 2005. Injuries dropped 37% over the same period. (National Traffic Safety Administration, 2006)"

between the idea of making a car out of stronger material and making a car with safety features.

For example: A padded dash. You can have a padded dash in a metal or plastic car. So this isn't a "plastic is great" deal.

Same with "crumple zones". Can metal be designed with crumple zones? Yes. So that isn't a plus for plastic either.

Collapsible steering shaft, airbags, side impact beams, submarine motor mounts, and on and on.

None of these are helped or prevented by plastic or metal. In fact, side impact beams were only needed because of the move to plastic left nothing in the door to protect you.

The point is, all these great safety features have nothing to do with plastic. The question is, in a major hit, do you want the car to fly apart on you leaving you to take the rest of the force? My main point is, metal is better because you can have all those other "safety features" and extra protection of a metal exterior.

I think a large number of people have bought into the car companies propaganda. Remember that car companies have invested interest in telling you plastic is just as safe. After all safety is a selling factor, and car companies must make money on selling tiny plastic cars in order to avoid CAFE fines.

Also people get hung up on crash ratings. Oh your old car has a lower test rating than my new plastic banana mobile. Problem is crash ratings are relative. The '07 Sub-compact plastic banana might score a 10/10, but only compared to other '07 Sub-compacts. Compare it to a '70 Suburban, which might score a 5/10, would still be far better than the midgets 10/10. I hope I explained that clear enough.

Ummm ... Formula 1 cars seem to have:
1) excellent handling - better than a Buick
2) excellent crash worthiness
3) they make extensive use of graphite fiber reinforced epoxy construction materials (AKA "Plastic")

1: no duh. I can say some pointless things too. Wendy's sells Hamburgers.

2: Do you think... just maybe... they could afford the best R&D and materials for a Formula 1 Car over a consumer general use automobile? Might be a possibility eh?

3: No joke.

Tell you what, you make an F1 car for 5 grand, I'll buy it. (I paid 5 grand for the Buick)

The point, that you didn't make, was that a Formula 1 race car has millions of dollars behind it. People do not have millions to spend on a car. If they did, we'd all be driving incredibly safe, incredibly fun, incredibly good handling formula race cars. But we don't, so we're not. Saying "there something out there that works" is pointless if we can't afford it.

Uh, I don't just THINK a lot of plastics are stronger than metal. I KNOW they are.

Case in point: The new Boeing 787 Dreamliner's airframe is over 50% composite materials (ie reinforced plastics), as is that of the Airbus A-380. Why did aircraft manufacturers spend hundreds of billions of R&D dollars to switch from traditional aluminum-alloy construction to composites? Precisely because composites are stronger, stiffer, and lighter than metal.

In the middle ages, body armor was made of metal. An accurate shot from a longbow could penetrate even the best armor, and with the invention of firearms, the "knight in shining armor" went the way of the catapult and the siege tower. Today's bulletproof vests and military helmets are made of - you guessed it - plastic. Imagine metal armor thick enough to stop high-powered rifle bullets! It would be so heavy you couldn't move.

Even armored vehicles like tanks are moving towards ceramic-reinforced composites instead of metal armor. Why? They're lighter and much stronger.

A modern car does not depend on simply being heavy and "strong" to survive an impact. The Honda that hit you was designed to get smashed flat in a crash. That's how it protects its occupants. Proper design of crumple zones and crushable spaces is far more important to vehicle safety than the thickness and tensile strength of the materials. Many old, heavy steel cars perform abominably in crash tests. The car's structure doesn't absorb any of the force, so the occupants take the full brunt.

A 2007 Honda weighs half as much as an '82 Buick, gets twice the gas mileage, and is considerably more survivable than the Buick in a collision. Yes, it'll come out looking like a crumpled cereal box (it's supposed to), but the occupants stand a better chance of walking away.

Much, much, MUCH more important than metal vs. plastic, heavy vs. light, SUV vs. Prius, in terms of surviving a crash, is WEARING YOUR SEAT BELT!!!

I'll buy all that. Sounds great. But why do I see plastic Honda's get all bashed up?

I have been rear-ended by a Honda. It was bashed up so bad, it was like a bull dogs face. The whole front end of his car was messed up. I'd have thought he just got it from the junk yard.

Now explain: If plastic is stronger, why was my car without a scratch, and the plastic mobile looking like it had been pulled from a garbage can? I mean I was stationary, and the plastic midget was only going 20 MPH or less, yet it was crushed. If plastic can't handle hitting just my chrome bumper at 20 MPH, you think it's going to do so much better at highway speeds? Sorry, I don't buy that.

You should have kept your ridiculous "30-foot" fall posting up as everyone got a good laugh out of it.

What are you talking about? Either I made a typo, or you are confusing posts. There was a story in the paper where a guy in an SUV fell 30 feet, landed upside down and walked away. My drop was about 10 feet and I was in a S10 extended cab, and luckily I landed upside up after flipping twice. If I said I dropped 30 feet, that was my error.

It's simple physics. Energy has to by transferred and absorption, slow wide spread transfer of energy, is the best. What you are **** is forcing all the absorption to happen to the other vehicle. This could injure or KILL someone else when it could have been less harmful. Sure your car would be just as damaged as theirs but it could save a life. I can hear your answer now ?they should have been driving something older and tougher like mine!?. Let me point out that two tanks hitting each other would seem to cause less damage but when they hit your body will take the worst of it. These tanks will ?bounce? off each other. Not absorbing the energy but transferring it in another direction and you will be jerked around like a rag doll (whiplash and torn muscle fibers is the worst to deal with?I would rather break a bone).
Plastic cars are meant to crumple at certain points. The engines are designed to submarine below the undercarriage rather than into your legs. Read some studies, turn on the discovery channel for God sake. Your tank is harder to maneuver and to bring to a stop. My mother?s Hyundai seems to handle like a sports car compared to my first car, a ?78 Grand Prix. I would say it can maneuver like my ?83 280zx. Most people with tanks just hold on and pray. People in newer cars (and sport cars) maneuver around, stop quicker, they react. When they do hit, people are rubber necking at the devastation but lives are saved.
On a side note: These ?safer? cars might be smashed beyond repair but it makes way for a newer car to replace it. The older relics will just keep hanging around with their pollution, inefficient fuel usage and leaking oil in parking lots. One day when you plow into something tougher than your tank, you?ll be wishing something else would have given instead of your head.

Try keeping to topic. An engine can be designed to submarine regardless of plastic or metal. This is not a point.

In the accidents I've been in, I never got hurt in the tank. True it doesn't handle as well as the Lumina, but it was a solid car too. Just from my limited experience I'd say the Buick stops better, and it's any harder to maneuver. Of course that's subjective.

I likely know a lot more about automotive technology than you do, especially if your source is the "Discovery" channel.

The air bag, seat belt and seats themselves have a ton more impact on how much energy absorption happens to the driver.

In all of those accidents you have been in...how many times did you get seriously hurt in a Honda or urethane paneled car?

I was never hurt, but I never had a plastic car.

86 B2000 Mazda Pickup, hit one car with it. No damage or injury.
88 Corsica, rear ended by a Mountaineer. Hit me doing over 55 MPH, car totaled. Not hurt at all.
96 S-10 Pickup, rear ended, slight damage, no injury.
96 S-10 Pickup, rolled twice, fell 10 feet, landed upside up in a creek. No injury.
96 Jeep Grand Cherokee (junk) rear ended by a car traveling fast enough to push me into a CR-V and that into a XL-R. Car totaled. No injury.
82 Buick Riviera, hit twice, one a minor tap, the other a Honda that slammed into my rear fast enough to bash in the whole front of his car. Radiator bashed in, quarter panels bent, bumper messed up completely. My chrome bumper has no sign of being hit yet. No injury.

I've never owned a plastic car, and given my history with cars, I never will if I can help it. There's only two cars I might make an exception for. For some screwball reason, I'd like a Lincoln Mark VIII and/or a 95+ RX-7 or RX-8. Don't ask me why, I can't figure it out either. I just like both of those. Of course with my debt and inability to manage money, it will never happen, oh well.

Let the new safety standard for manufacturers be to withstand Andy.

Yes, let's build our cars based on probability that one day we will plunge off a 30 foot drop and land on the roof.

I am just wondering...did the guy in the Honda Civic walk away from the accident? I will take your posting that the "whole front end of his car was bashed in like a bull dogs face" but no mention of the driver as a "Yes, he walked away from it". That Civic owner probably would have walked away from an accident with a large SUV due to the safety features found within his Honda Civic. You, on the other hand would probably not be so lucky in a wreck with a SUV as your car does not have many of the internal safety features that Honda Civic had. Another point I would like to make is that your little "land tank" puts out at least 8 to 10 times the emissions of that Honda Civic and your car is one reason that the glaciers are melting, the seas are dying and the bumble-bee is disappearing. By the way...most (non-convertible) cars have roll-cages that prevent most crushing in case of a roll-over. That guy in the SUV was just as likely to escape from an SUV as he would have a newer generation sub-compact such as the Honda Fit. Your story seems to be a bit in question as an SUV dropping from a roll-off angle at 30 feet would not have landed directly on the roof and would have it the front of the car first then landing 'with extremely low inertia' on its roof. Most cars could easily survive a dead landing on the front bumper to a low inertia roll onto the roof and a great percentage of drivers would easily walk away from that. Now...go buy a Honda and quit destroying our environment!

Yet somehow you can get away with "That Civic owner probably would have walked away from an accident with a large SUV"? How does this work. You expect me to have facts while you can say "probably".

I have no problem with CO2 emissions. So your point is irrelevant to me. You should check your facts about CO2 and global warming. It's a scam. The science, when peer reviewed, does not support it. I'd love to debate you on this. If you wish to debate global warming, start a thread, I'll give you so much information about junk science you'll wonder how anyone ever believe in the global warming stupidity. (hint: it's a money grab)

Sadly I do not have the story. I can't back this up, so you can do with it as you please. It was in the news paper about 3 years ago. If I can find the story, I'll post it here.

Yeah yeah, I'm destroying the environment. You'll believe anything your told. Do some research on that, and look at both sides. Global warming (as it relates to human involvement) is a sham. CO2 is a normal natural gas in the environment. Stop breathing, you are making that dead CO2 gas.

just something interesting that popped into my head. a long time ago i saw the calculations of how much CO2 and ozone damage was done every time they/we launch the space shuttle. the number was amazing but for some reason i have never seen any more research in that area. hummmmm.........makes me wonder why!

When car manufacturers do something, they have three reasons for doing so. 1st reason - cost, 2nd reason - cost, 3rd reason cost. So reguardless off plastic, steel, aluminum or what ever, there primary concern is cost. I hate to sound sceptical but I have seen to many instances where shaving corners to save a nickel up front in the manufacuring process has cost the consumer big time later.(especially with the North American manufacturers who due to there poor quality and costly repair problems are in a desperate state). Everything from transmissions that cost thousands in repairs to premature brake rotor failures because a bit of weather sheilding that cost peanuts was left off. Some of them have even gone to replacing galvanized metal in there frames with waxed non galvanived metal. The wax is cheaper and gets them passed the warranty period, then it is your problem.
Sure they are trying to meet improved millage requirements but not that this is only because they are legislated to do so. All one needs to do is look at history - the big 3 have resisted most improvements - seatbelts, catilitic converters, bumpers cabable of widthstanding low velosity collisions as well improved millage requirements just to name few. In each case, they have made proposterous claims as to the costs. In the case of catalytic converts, I beleive they claimed it would add over $1000.00 to the unit price (I can by one at my local auto supply for under $100.00 today).I hate to be skeptical but there is a lot of history to support what I say and I do not see things changing much going forward!

The hail must have been soft. I come from tornado alley and I have seen and experienced hail the size of which you speak. It destroys all cars when hard enough. I know what you are saying right now. What? Soft hail? Yes some hail is harder (or softer) than other hail.

I find that hard to believe, but then I'm not sure how the Fiero is constructed.

My parents had a perfect comparison. My father owns a Tahoe, and my mother bought a PT Cruiser. After a hail storm the PT Cruiser was so pelted with small bumps, it looked like someone had setup a tenis ball thrower at it and unloaded a whole bin of balls. Meanwhile the Tahoe showed no signs it had ever hailed.

Question: Why? Well my experience at a dealership helps here. At the dealership, in talking with the guy that installed sun roofs, he told me that they now charge about $500 to $1000 more than they used to. The reason is, before they just cut a hole and put in the sun roof. Now however, the metal is so incredibly thin (for gas mileage) that in the process of cutting, it warps the whole roof. So they have to cut a tiny whole, then cut larger, then larger, until they get the hole as big as they need. Doing it this way take more time (hence higher cost) but it doesn't warp the roof of the car.

Back to the Cruiser verses the Tahoe. The Tahoe is a truck, with a lower CAFE standard, so they can make the metal thick. Thick metal, like all cars used to be, will not be damaged by hail. Thin metal, like on the PT Cruisers, is so thin a little hail will dent it.

Final point: the reason why plastic is better than metal in a hail storm, is simply because government regulations prevent auto makers from putting enough metal on the car to be tough.

But this is minor. You are not likely to be killed by hail. But you are likely to be killed by a metal car slicing through your plastic Fiero.

I wonder what damages would be to cars that had the same density of materials. Your metal trucks will soon be gone as they are too costly to produce and WAY TOO COSTLY TO THE ENVIRONMENT! It is not feasible to continue to make bodies from steel and/or thick metal. Your trucks and cars made of metal are so heavy and so inefficient in terms of gas usage and high levels of emissions that soon they will be outlawed. If the same density of plastic/urethane were to meet with the same density of aluminum (which is what many of your newer 'metal'-bodied cars are made of), the aluminum would lose in the battle of resiliency. Take this example...go and get an aluminum soda can and a plastic soda bottle(somewhat equal in their thickness) and crush both with your feet. Now, which one actually stood up to your crushing weight? That aluminum can is as flat as a pancake while that plastic still held it shape. that is why it is easy to replace plastic quarter panels but once a 'metal' car is wrecked there is usually no way to restore it without paying an arm and a leg to a body shop who may or may not be able to fashion a properly fitting panel/section for your "all-metal" body. The vast majority of cars are no longer primarily made of steel and will never be again due to the sheer weight along with the overwhelming cost to produce them. Most new cars today are nearly fully recycleable and will be used in the making of future cars, homes, sprinklers, lawnmowers, and storage containers, while your 'metal' car/truck will be rusting away in some junk yard continuing to destroy our planet sitting there dripping rust and corrosion into the groundwater that many of our plants and animals (and ourselves) depend on.

Get a clue if you think somebody will take your old metal car or truck and actually ship it ot be melted down into reusable materials. It WILL end up like all of the other metal cars that preceded it and be sent to some area in the desert or in some secluded area in the hills where it will waste away as stated above.

You remember some cans are still made from steel right? Actually I do not know if they still are, but... when I was in high school I was heavier than I am now.

I used to take a steel can and stand on top of it, and it would hold me up. Name one plastic bottle that could do that. (could take awhile)

No an aluminum can, will not do that. As to a car, it depends on how they manufacture the aluminum. As for the plastic, minor hits plastic is better. But for life endangering damage, you are more likely to die in a plastic car than a metal one.

if you were to apply some engineering to the aluminum or plastic it will hold you up too! just add convolutions(sp?),make wavey, to the sides, so the creases follow the length and that same cylinder becomes increadably strong
but if you make the creases go around the diameter it gets VERY weak and that is how they make crumple zones!

Ok, I do agree. Yes it is true that by making aluminum in certain shapes it can hold more up and be many times stronger.

But the same holds true for steel as well. Moreover, doing the same thing to steel will yield a much higher strength level, because your base line strength is higher.

The trade off comes with the amount of engineering and added reinforcement over takes the benefit of using aluminum, or any other material.

If plastic is reinforced to reach the same level of strength as steel, does it still save enough weight savings and still cheap enough to be doable?

So far, in order to save weight, and save cost, they lost strength. Now if you can show me otherwise, great! But from what I've seen thus far, the plastic is weaker by far. (although not so much compared to paper this metals used on *some* cars)