1979 monza crash test

[lleelduo]

Interesting video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x17p6xkr48M

[ol55]

Larry, Thanks For posting.

Around 5 minutes, it looks like the "upper" unibody is moving and the lower body is staying in place. Interesting.


Larry

[marco_1978_spyder]

Neat video, Thanks for sharing it.. I thought it was going to be a re-run of the hatchback. I hadn't seen the coupe. It appears to me that

1. It did better than the hatch in this crash...

2. seems to have done what you'd want, and the designer's intended it do...crumple the trunk area to absorb the energy, while allowing the passenger area to stay intact.

3. The seat backs seemed to have failed, but it seems like that may have also lessened head trauma, as the dummies heads seemed to stay in the same general area of space and time, over the course of the impact.

4. I wonder if that test mule had a spare tire.... would have been interesting to see a few more tests with typical things in the trunk, like golf clubs or tools or a full sized spare tire.

[Monza Harry]

4. I wonder if that test mule had a spare tire.... would have been interesting to see a few more tests with typical things in the trunk, like golf clubs or tools or a full sized spare tire.

Marco My '76 had the full size spare from the factory and the hold down was probably a 5/16" rod, with some kind of "flange" and large wing nut (in addition to the one behind the steering wheel) I never made it move and I tried! Etc. I did change it over to the inflate a spare and I would be way more worried about that CO2 canister as I don't recall anything holding that in there and it was HEAVY and steel, no big soft rubber doughnut [tire] to lessen the blow! I wondered about younger kids [10/12yrs.] in the back seat, mom and dad on their laps and no head rest to protect their necks. Harry P.S. here is the hatch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whXw6z2CIoA

[Sunula66]

Harry,
lol you ole Night-hawk...I couldn't help but wonder if you might have had flash backs after this video, as maybe I did when one of the members here showed us a vid of an H getting crushed at the recycler's lol...but in all seriousness, these cars took a pretty good whalop and I'm impressed. That being said, how do they measure up by todays standards? It would be interesting to see a low mileage "drone" model of an H take a test today but I myself don't have a donor car other than my parts biotch and it's pretty soft..(my John Deere stressed it when I pulled it with three flats and itsa lawn tractor) ...I always keep in mind when driving our relics the body and metal fatigue possibilities.
On a side note: keep in mind certain items and hardware become additional injury causing objects. The mention of tire jacks and tools and even the tire mentioned by Harry reminded me of a couple of crashes that I attended. The most serious being that of two concrete chimney blocks placed in the rear compartment(for traction weight) of a Gremlin that was hit head on. The woman driver survived however lucky as when I pulled the seat back that was crushed and held forward by the blocks releasing her. It's these sorts of items that become projectiles when not held in place. Also, don't keep pens in your pockets when driving as they impale the occupant in a crash.
Test vehicles are tested under controlled circumstances so wondering why the spare tire stuff wasn't there myself.
Winter driving is approaching in a lot of our member's areas and will soon be here and the H-body's are being stored away. Please be safe on the roads this winter everyone. Videos like these remind us of what could happen and our newer cars and trucks still leave us vulnerable.

[classic_cruiser]

That video brings back bad memories of when I was rear-ended in my '80 sunbird coupe back in '89... crumpled almost exactly the same way, although not quite as bad. I was hit by a 4-door late 80's full-size oldsmobile at 40MPH while I was almost at a standstill. Didn't break the glass but it bent the wheel wells so hard they rubbed on the insides of the tires, bent the trunk down the same way, jammed the doors shut, but the trunk lid was undamaged. I had a large toolbox, a camera in a camera bag, and a tripod across the rear in the trunk. Surprisingly, only the aluminum tripod was damaged by a single little dent.

The full-size olds faired worse... wiped out the entire front end, hood, and the engine started burning antifreeze before she could get it shut off.

Terry

[Monza Harry]

My '71 Poncho Ventura II was rammed into out front years ago and sandwiched between the ramey and another [parked] full-size and it bent it so hard it pulled the battery out of it's mount and the centre post (4-door) right out of the roof! I just went in and hadn't even finished sitting down when it was hit but for all the damage the passenger compartment wasn't altered much, that was a 10yr. old rust belt car, almost 30yrs. ago The Manufacturers had a pretty good handle on these things for a long time now. The owners manual warns us, even in my '71 about storing "Projectiles in the passenger area, as do things like all my stereo speaker instructions, warning to secure adequately And I just did a follow up to Marco's inquiry about the spare! Harry

[marco_1978_spyder]

I slid a Monza out in front of a 65 Chrysler New yorker and got T boned by it. The monza drove home, but was gone.