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Opposite Lock.(European safety standards hurt car performance)
Byline: Kevin A. Wilson
To improve performance, add lightness. That credo is rarely honored anymore. Performance cars like the two-ton Mercedes SL55 AMG or Bentley's new GT even seem to overwhelm extreme mass with technological might.
At a relatively meager 3009 pounds, even the Enzo Ferrari superexotic is more than 12 percent overweight in the eyes of its engineers. Outperforming the 10-year-old McLaren F1 was one goal, so Ferrari engineers aimed for 1200 kilograms or about 2646 pounds, just over McLaren's 2579-pound curb weight. Despite extensive use of carbon fiber and light metal alloys, they missed by 165 kilograms, or 363 pounds.
Why? Because a 2004 European safety standard, an offset rear crash test, required an impact-absorbing structural mass high in the rear corners. This added (aluminum) structure initiated the engineer's nightmare cascade: A little more weight requires thicker springs to hold it up, and heftier control arms, which need bigger bushings. Slightly bigger tires are needed to achieve the cornering targets, slightly bigger brakes, maybe some engine technology to offset the mass with more power, etc. etc. Soon, your lean and mean machine looks like it's had a few too many desserts lately.
The dessert tray is carried by regulators who see issuing mandates to the car manufacturers as an easier means of achieving safety than the tougher measures of teaching people to drive better, or improving highways. And if one standard saves one bonehead's life, we only need 40,000 more standards to eliminate highway deaths, right? Mass is, in other words, a heavy price we all pay for condoning ignorance.
The ...
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Source: HighBeam Research, Opposite Lock.(European safety standards hurt car performance)