Many cars fall short in head restraint tests
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Head restraints in many passenger vehicles provided marginal or poor protection against neck injuries and whiplash, the insurance industry reported in new crash test results.
Only 22 of 75 vehicles tested in a simulated rear crash at 20 mph received the top score of good from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.
Many 2007 vehicles got the lowest score of poor in the tests. The vehicles include the Acura TSX, some versions of the BMW 5 Series, the Buick Lacrosse and Lucerne, the Cadillac CTS, STS and DTS, the Chevrolet Aveo, the Pontiac Grand Prix, the Honda Accord and Fit, the Hyundai Accent, the Infiniti M35, the Jaguar X-Type, the Kia Rio, the Mitsubishi Galant, the Toyota Avalon, the Toyota Corolla, and the Suzuki Forenza and Reno.
The institute estimates that neck injuries account for 2 million insurance claims annually costing at least $8.5 billion.
Among the top vehicles for head protection, according to the institute’s testing, were the Audi A4, A6 and S4, the Chevrolet Cobalt, the Ford Five Hundred, the Mercury Montego, the Hyundai Sonata, the Jaguar S-Type, the Kia Optima, the Mercedes E-Class, the Nissan Sentra and Versa, the Saab 9-3, the Subaru Impreza, Outback and Legacy, the Volvo S40, S60, S80, and versions of the Honda Civic and the Volkswagen New Beetle.
“People think of head restraints as headrests, but they’re not. They’re important safety features,” said Adrian Lund, the institute’s president. “You’re more likely to need the protection of a good head restraint than the other safety devices in your vehicle because rear-end crashes are so common.”
The vehicles were tested on a crash simulation sled, replicating the forces in a stationary vehicle that is struck in the rear by a similar vehicle at 20 mph.
Cars got a higher rating if the restraint contacted the dummy’s head quickly and the forces on the dummy’s neck and the acceleration of the torso were low.
Models that received poor or marginal scores for the restraint design were given poor overall marks because they could not be positioned to protect many motorists.
