It says the exactly opposite of your comment. The VW is safe, can be repaired and is comparable to normal cars with a hood.
This happens so often in comment sections, people drop a lengthy video, noone wants to watch a 15 minute video and they have a "proof" for their argument.
Well, at least when compared to cars from 1984. I wonder how it would fare against a modern car?
Cars are much safer today, the paper below says that the probability of a driver being killed in a new 2008-2012 car is 0.29 versus 0.42 in a new 1985-1993 model year car.
> (another interesting finding from that paper is that the probability of death increases as the vehicle ages, even within the same model year)
Looks like they don't speculate much on it -- they mention improvements in driver behavior over time and maintenance. Not bad, but my first thoughts were:
* a 20 year old vehicle is often driven by a person with a different socioeconomic situation than someone with a 1 year old vehicle, and those economic situations correlate heavily with other driving behaviors.
* as vehicles are getting safer and more powerful, highway speeds are rising, so 20 year old vehicle that are just keeping up with traffic are going faster than they used to.
VW doesn't seem to make any van in the USA, I took a quick look and don't see any current rear-engined VW vans like the Vanagan sold in any country, but do see some front-engined styles sold in other countries.
Where do they still sell a rear engined Vanagan style van?
Wikipedia says the T3 was the last of the VW rear engined vans (last made in 2002 for the African market, and 1990 in Germany).
ICE firewalls are designed to deflect the enginedown and under in a head on collision. Vans with engine sitting between the driver and passenger in a doghouse, or worse engine in back makes their knees first on the scene of impact with little protection. The more bodywork and chassis/monocoque between you and the crumple zone the better.
Yes that was said at the time about why flat front vehicles were safe in the sixties. rule of thumb is the heavier/bigger the vehicle the more front end protection you have. These look pretty flimsy like the Grummans.
Hopefully they have designed bracing into the frame to protect occupants.It's the high speed impacts by other vehicles that are the worry. Multi stop delivery is a major risk on busy roads. At least the design has the driver's feet just behind the front axle, would be interested to see the impact crumple one design.
I see a nose; looks like it sticks out about 6" past the bottom of the windshield? And the wikipedia article makes it sound like that is exactly the portion used as a "defomation area" to protect the legs of those in the front of the cab?
If that's a nose, then what isn't a nose? The next generation Eurovan and up had a very distinct "nose", which is what is being discussed in this conversation.
The nose is just somewhere for the front wheel to go. Otherwise the driver has to step over it to mount the vehicle. The VW looks like it's considerably higher off the ground which means more stepping up and stepping down, hundreds of times a day. You could put the wheel behind the cab, but that's terrible for manoeuvrability. It's better to have the wheels at the corners of the vehicle as much as possible.
Why have a nose at all?
Put driver's seat over the front wheels. Like the VW Vanagon (Eurovans). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Type_2_(T3)
These are gonna be EVs, right? Might as well do it right.