2015 Lexus RC & NX: IIHS Crash Test

If you’ve paid attention to the IIHS crash test data (which you can find in the “Technical Measurements” tab, under each model’s test category, on the IIHS official webpage), then you may have an impression that, compared to its German luxury car competitors, Lexus usually has inferior crash test results.

For example for the moderate overlap front test, when measuring the footwell intrusion, the current GS sedan has structure deformation around 6-9 cm; but for the Mercedes-Benz E class, BMW 5-series, Audi A6, they all have those numbers in the 1-2 cm league, which means in the crash test, the Lexus GS has more severe deformation in its...

2015 Toyota Camry: What Does the Top Safety Pick+ mean?

Since the IIHS (Insurance Institute for Highway Safety) introduced the small overlap crash test back in August 2012, Toyota/Lexus has been struggling with this tough challenge for two years.

According to IIHS’s requirement, if a car does NOT perform well in the small overlap crash test, it will not earn the “Top Safety Pick+” rating. And this has been a major block for many Toyota/Lexus vehicles to get this rating.

Although Toyota has put in some effort previously, which made the 2014 Highlander  to be rated as the “Top Safety Pick+”, its small overlap testing result is still not the best, which only gets an “Acc...

This is not a latest news, but we just found it out.

Last month, IIHS has also conducted the small overlap test on the 2014 E-Class. Please pay attention that the testing result only applies to the 2014 model build after Janurary 2014, not for all of the 2014 model.

The reason is that, starting Janurary 2014 production, Mercedes-Benz made structural enhancements to the E-Class, mainly in the footwell area of the occupant compartment. From the below image from IIHS, the improved E-Class did fairly well, there is no excessive deformation in the safety cage.

For all auto makers, since more recent new models are designed after IIHS released the small overlap test standard, ...

Today IIHS released its BMW 2-series crash testing results and the corresponding rating.

Generally speaking the 2-series got a Top Safety Pick Plus result, which is because it achieved “Good” results in all testing categories, including the small overlap front test, which is shown in the below image (released by IIHS). From the photo you can see the 2-seires has very good safety cage strength to handle the frontal impact energy: there is no excessive deformation around the A pillar area.

However, we also found some weak points in the BMW 2-series, from the crash test.

1...

Today IIHS released its crash test result for the 2015 VW GTI and Golf (they are essentially based on the same platform and share the same frame structure). They got “Good” result for all testing categories, which earns them the Top Safety Pick Plus rating.

The highlights of the result are in the small overlap front test and also the side impact test. For the small overlap test, unlike some cars that use the “trick” to slide over the test barrier, avoiding a direct impact to the car body to get a good result, the 2015 VW GTI directly hit the barrier...