Frontal NCAP performance and field injury over 40 years

Figures & data

Table

Manufacturer	1980	1990	2000	2010	2020
Ford:	1984 Escort,	1987 Escort,	2000 Focus,	2015 Focus,	2017 Fusion.
General Motors:	1984 Cavalier,	1990 Cavalier,	2001 Malibu,	2011 Malibu,	2020 Malibu.
Honda:	1979 Civic,	1989 Civic,	1999 Civic,	2013 Civic,	2018 Accord.
Nissan:	1979 Datsun 210,	1989 Maxima,	2004 Maxima,	2012 Maxima,	2020 Maxima.
Toyota:	1979 Celica, others	1987, 1992 Camry,	2000 Camry,	2011 Camry,	2018 Camry.

Table

1980:	8 manual belts, 2 passive belts.
1990:	2 manual belts, 4 passive belts and 1 vehicle with driver airbag.
2000:	5 manual belts, 4 advanced airbags, 1 1st generation airbag, 3 pretensioners with load limiters.
2010:	5 manual belts, 5 advanced airbags, 5 pretensioners with load limiters, 1 knee airbag.
2020:	5 manual belts, 5 advanced airbags, 5 pretensioners with load limiters, 4 knee airbags.

Table

1980:	50th Part 572 dummy with 8 channels of data, triaxial head acceleration, triaxial chest acceleration and left and right femur load.
1990:	4 tests with the 50th Part 572 dummy with 8 channels of data and one test with the 50th Hybrid III with 30 channels of data, including triaxial pelvis acceleration, 6 channels of upper neck forces and moments, 1 channel of chest deflection, 6 channels of foot triaxial acceleration and 6 channels for the upper and lower tibia force (compression and moments).
2000:	50th Hybrid III with 30 channels of data as listed above.
2010:	50th Hybrid III driver and 5th Hybrid III passenger as listed above.
2020:	50th Hybrid III driver and 5th Hybrid III passenger with 36 channels of data reduction to 3 channels of upper neck (tension and fore-aft shear and flexion moment).
2020:	50th Thor dummy research tests with 34 channels of instrumentation, including triaxial head rotational acceleration, 3 neck channels (neck tension, fore-aft shear and flexion moment) and 4 channels of ankle rotation and moments.

Table 1. Percent reduction in dummy responses by decade since the 1980 NCAP baseline.

MY^a	Driver		Right-front passenger
	HIC15	3 ms g	HIC15	3 ms g
1980	—NCAP baseline—^b
1990	40 ± 19%	18 ± 5%	68 ± 52%	13 ± 5%
2000	56 ± 31%	19 ± 6%	67 ± 47%	6 ± 2%
2010	76 ± 53%	23 ± 6%	75 ± 56%	−4 ± 1%
2020	76 ± 32%	22 ± 6%	71 ± 49%	6 ± 2%

^aVehicle MY within ±4 years of the start of decade. ^bData is percent reduction from baseline with ± standard deviation.

Figure 1. Vehicle weight by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 2. Front crush by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 3. Vehicle dynamics in NCAP tests with eight generations of Nissan Maxima and the early Datsun 210.

Figure 4. Intrusion of the firewall (plenum) by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Table 2. 1994–2015 NASS field data for frontal crashes with belted use and adjustment to 1988–1991 NASS data from Kahane (1994).

Delta-V		1994–2015 NASS^a			1988–1991 NASS				HIC15 at field risk
mph	km/h	MAIS 0 + F	MAIS 4 + F	Risk	Risk^b	94–15 Adjusted to ‘88–91			'94–'15	'88–'91
				(%)	(%)	Risk	Injured	Difference
<10	<16	3,326,077	3,193	0.096%	–	0.40	1,277	−1,916	85	63
10–15	16–24	3,602,537	1,972	0.055%	–	0.40	789	−1,183	70	54
15–20	24–32	1,702,959	2,779	0.163%	–	0.40	1,112	−1,667	106	74
20–25	32–40	700,966	4,493	0.641%	0.25%	0.39	1,752	−2,741	219	130
25–30	40–48	216,125	2,328	1.077%	0.43%	0.40	929	−1,399	299	173
30–35	48–56	69,244	3,239	4.677%	4.60%	0.98	3,186	−53	628	624
35–40	56–64	31,963	2,327	7.279%	14.1%	1.94	4,508	2,181	747	942
40–45	64–72	13,678	2,063	15.083%	31.0%	2.06	4,240	2,177	963	1215
>45	>72	16,471	4,651	28.240%	57.3%	2.03	9,437	4,786	1179	1517
	Overall	9,680,020	27,045	0.279%			27,230	185	137	138
							0.281%^c

^aViano, Parenteau (2022), ^bKahane (1994) for crashes above 20 mph delta-V, ^cadjusted overall risk in 1988–1991 NASS.

Figure 5. Driver HIC₁₅ by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 6. Driver chest acceleration by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 7. Driver head injury risk based on HIC₁₅ by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 8. Driver chest injury risk based on chest acceleration by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 9. Passenger HIC₁₅ by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 10. Passenger chest acceleration by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 11. Passenger head injury risk based on HIC₁₅ by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 12. Passenger chest injury risk based on chest acceleration by decade for selected NCAP tests.

Figure 13. Risk for severe injury with belt use in frontal crashes by delta-V.

Figure 14. Frequency of frontal crash exposure and severe injury (MAIS 4 + F) with injury risk and se and equivalent HIC₁₅.

Figure 15. Risk for serious injury (MAIS 3 + F) in belted and unbelted drivers (top) and passengers (bottom) by vehicle MY.

Kahane CJ., January 1994. Correlation of NCAP performance with fatality risk in actual head-on collisions. DOT HS 808 061. Washington (DC): NHTSA.

 Google Scholar

Data availability statement

The crash test movies, data and reports are available from the NHTSA website (https://www.nhtsa.gov/research-data/research-testing-databases#/) using the test number (#) as a guide. Additional information on the data analysis can be requested of the author at [email protected].