Watching a car crash into a stationary object will always result in a cringing moment where you look at what was a perfectly serviceable vehicle and mutter to yourself, “Jeez, look at where that folded up…and how that broke…” and so on and so forth. If you are a real masochist you’ll look up the vehicle you normally drive just to see how it fared. (I’ve done that. Don’t do that. It’ll break your heart.) The older you go, the more the damage starts to open your eyes…you can find a wide variety of vehicles being crash tested on YouTube, even the infamous Ford Pinto vs. Chevrolet Impala exploding fuel tank test. But we found a British Pathé film showing crash testing for British Motor Corporation vehicles from 1961-1965 and had to take a look. We almost wish we hadn’t.
Admittedly, we looked because one of the tested vehicles was the vaunted Mini, the real one, the Italian Job one. The crash testing you will see is performed between 25, 30 and 38 miles an hour, and we’ve never felt sorrier for a crash test dummy than we did watching the Mini drill the wall at the top speed. The only thing that is keeping the dummy’s forehead from going through the glass and kissing the back edge of the bonnet is the thin steering wheel…and we aren’t sure the passenger-side dummy didn’t hit the hood. You’ll also see the BMC 1100, 1800 and MGB undergo the last ride into the wall, being shoved by a Ford station wagon, and the results are pretty much the same. We’ve never seen a crash-test dummy actually get whiplash until this video!
My first car was a ’78 mini 1100 special…..
– seat belts; check
– head rests; nope
– collapsable steering; nope
– safety glass; nope
In this film the seat belts snapped.
@6.13 I wonder what the technician is thinking.
That looks like death trap
I really want to see my 58 chevy viking lcf crash test now…….. it’s a tank of a thing!!