Peter Frederick wrote:
Unless I'm mistaken, the Ponton was the first chassis with crumple
zones and a rigid passenger compartment. the Adenauer was the last car
built with a separate chassis with body bolted on.
Makes Detroit's refusal to do anything to make cars safer look pretty
shabby.
Which was actually the point of Ralph Nader's book, "Unsafe at Any
Speed." I'd gotten the impression, from the automotive press, that it
was mostly a diatribe against the Corvair's unusual handling
characteristics. When I read it I was surprised to find that it was, in
fact, mostly about other safety flaws that applied to many cars, and
about the general lack of interest Detroit had in safety at the time.
Problems like hard-surfaced dashboards, non-collapsible steering
columns, chrome trim in the driver's eye line, and cars sold with tires
that weren't designed to support their fully loaded weight. It's still
an interesting read, just to see where we've come from.
