Wow! What a spectacular little film from my archive about smashing together servo controlled remotely piloted cars with onboard video (very high tech!) into head on collisions with astounding discoveries - among them that the seat belts of the time routinely snapped in half, sending dummy passengers through windshields, and splattered in the face with battery acid from the other car! Watch the smaller cars literally disappear into the engine compartments of the larger vehicles! See seat belt hardware simply shatter... watch as head rests become missiles... OH The Humanity! Really shows the contrast to today's vehicles which have only been made possible by these very kinds of collision tests. As always I transferred this reel with my own Telecine. Enjoy!
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#pinto #ford #chevy
- Intro Music by Fran Blanche -
Fran on Twitter - https://twitter.com/contourcorsets
Fran's Science Blog - http://www.frantone.com/designwritings/design_writings.html
FranArt Website - http://www.contourcorsets.com
Join Team FranLab!!!! Become a patron and help support my YouTube Channel on Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/frantone
#pinto #ford #chevy
- Intro Music by Fran Blanche -
Fran on Twitter - https://twitter.com/contourcorsets
Fran's Science Blog - http://www.frantone.com/designwritings/design_writings.html
FranArt Website - http://www.contourcorsets.com
Backwards music…
Freaky theme music!
to quote Bart Simpson: The best part was when the buildings fell down!
We used to call the Pinto> The Explodomatic because when slammed in the rear end> BOOM! gas tank explodes. Seen it happen. Of coarse, Pintos & Vegas were used extensively in racing of all sorts. Mainly only the body work. All else was re constructed.
I remember the "Road Safety Authority" in Australia , back in the 1970s , showing footage of these test collisions on t.v. to promote seatbelt safety . As a young child at the time it really "scared me straight" and I'd never get in a car without a seatbelt after that .
I love how they class a Chevy Vega as a "small" car .
I remember this propaganda "type" film type. They were on TV back in the late 60's and upto the late 1970's. These films were meant to steer americans towards buying larger, gas-guzzling Detroit-built cars.
I had a 71 Vega. I’m glad I chose the Vega instead of a Pinto. If I had crashed in a Pinto, I would have been crushed to bits and burned up. With the Vega I would have merely been beheaded.😊
Fran, I really dig your in/out music. You could have fooled me into believing it was scored in the 70s. In it there's a sound reminiscent of a bongos roll. So interesting! But anyway, beyond nailing the genre it's good stuff on its own merit. I'm going to have to search out your other music.
Fran, that was awesome! Some very interesting technology of the day to remotely drive the cars into one another. If only we had the money to drive many of the cars of today into one another. I would be curious to see a Tesla and Ford F-150 remotely crashed into one another. Could probably sell tickets for that.
Vega actually held up pretty well in the first crash (at least before the rust compromises it). Needed front opening hood or better latches. True story: in the mid 70's a guy in a '68 Camaro ran a stop on my street and hit a lady in the side. (no deaths) The engine and front subframe of the Camaro went UNDER the Camaro as there are only about four bolts holding it to the floor of the car. Camaro/Firebird are not full unibody cars and frequently they get cracks in the a-pillars at the top of the windshield showing that they are not structurally sound designs.
Physics…. This film also a good choice this week with that NASA DART mission. Same physics of impacts of relative masses. I seem to recall having to calculate something like this in a class long ago. 2 masses of different values and different velocities hitting on different trajectories. Where and how fast do they end up going?
Ooof, watching more of this, I am concerned about the test crew. A high viewed shot of the Galaxie vs the Pinto and there is a bunch of folks with a canopy pretty close to the track and impact…. Did they not think about debris flying?
With Smart Cars driving among SUVs and trucks, doesn't seem things have changed, yet have gas prices improved since OPEC?