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American Morning
New Report Examines SUV Crash Tests
Aired July 31, 2001 - 10:01 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Sports utility vehicle owners tower over traffic, you know, like the 800 pound gorillas of the auto industry. But a new study may cut them all down to size.
At this hour, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety is releasing the findings of its crash tests for the new generation of midsize SUVs and it looks like both bumpers and billfolds are going to be taking a beating.
CNN's Kathleen Koch is at the Institute's vehicle research center in Virginia. She's got a closer look for us this morning -- Kathleen, good morning.
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Leon.
Well, you're absolutely right. The vehicle research center tested seven of the newest midsize SUVs and all but one did not fare very well. These SUVs that people are paying upwards of $30,000 for actually have bumpers that are pretty flimsy.
We're going to take a look first at our very best performer. Now, that was the 2001 Acura MDX. And if we look at that, in one of the tests it was, what we're seeing now is a test where it backed up into a pole. All the tests are five mile per hour crashes. And in this, you will see that the Acura MDX sustained really very little damage. Its average damage in the four tests that they conducted, both front and rear, was just $448.
Next we'll look at the SUV that actually in the four tests performed the worst, and that was the Suzuki Grand Vitara XL-7. And we're also going to see it backing up into a pole. There we go. Now, did you see the windshield, the rear window shatter there in that test? That vehicle sustained, in most of the tests, an average of $1,451 in damage, which the research institute here considers not acceptable.
Now, David Zuby is in charge of the testing that goes on here. David, let's walk around and look at some of these vehicles and let's talk about what happened.
What about this Acura here? This did really well.
DAVID ZUBY, INSURANCE INSTITUTE: Yes. The Acura is the best performing of the seven vehicles overall. It didn't do the best in the poll tests, but in the poll tests it only sustained $700 damage. Mainly what you see here is that the bumper cover is torn and needs to be replaced.
KOCH: What about the Suzuki behind you? This is pretty dramatic. We saw in the viewpoint how this rear window just shattered. It's still shattering.
ZUBY: Yes, the problem with the Suzuki Grand Vitara and other vehicles that have a rear mounted spare tire is that the spare tire actually hangs out behind the bumper. So it's the first thing to contact a pole or a wall or another vehicle in a crash. And consequential the tailgate, which isn't really the strongest part of the car, has to carry the brunt of that load.
It caves in the tailgate, blows out the windshield, the whole thing needs to be replaced.
KOCH: OK, let's walk over here to vehicles that actually performed worse than the Suzuki if we step over here. Tell me about this one. What are we seeing here?
ZUBY: Well, this is the Buick Rendezvous and it's the corporate cousin to the Pontiac Aztec over here. The big problem here is that the bumper bar isn't strong enough to hold the car off of the pole in this case. You can see that the bumper bar is cracked in half and when it cracks in half and when it cracks in half the two broken ends push into the rear body panel. The whole tailgate is damaged. You can't, a lot of the damage is inside, but it needs to be replaced. Very costly repairs in this case.
KOCH: Now, you say that this vehicle over here is a sister vehicle. They have the same frame, is that correct?
ZUBY: Right. Underneath they share a lot of the same components, a little bit of different styling on the outside. One of the things that accounts for the difference in costs to repair the Aztec compared to the Rendezvous is that this tailgate is two pieces, and so we only damaged the lower part and have to replace it, whereas in the Rendezvous we've got a big tailgate that's very costly and we have to replace the whole thing.
KOCH: OK, what about one of our mid-level performers right behind you here, the Toyota. Now, Toyota, this is not an inexpensive vehicle.
ZUBY: No, this is not an inexpensive vehicle. Like most of these vehicles this is about a $30,000 vehicle. I think this finishes in the middle of the ranks, but in the rear pole test it's actually the best performer, only sustaining about $500 worth of damage. As you can see, there's very little visible damage but the bumper bar underneath needs to be replaced and some other minor details.
KOCH: So what's the message to SUV owners?
ZUBY: Well, I think one of the things that people forget when they buy an SUV or they think when they buy an SUV is that it's a rough and tough vehicle when, in actuality, it's really just like a car. In many cases the bumpers aren't built strong enough to survive even the little dings and scrapes that you might experience in a parking lot.
KOCH: All right. David, thank you.
And we'll be back in a next hour to show you a little bit more of these tests and take a look at how these vehicles performed in some of the front end crashes -- back to you, Leon.
HARRIS: All right, thanks Kathleen.
We want to add here that Suzuki has issued a statement in response to the Insurance Institute testing. The company says, and we quote here, "All testing results are carefully analyzed and any necessary engineering changes are incorporated before the final design of a vehicle goes into production. Suzuki is always willing to take into consideration any new information that could lead to meaningful real world improvements that provide our customers with greater value. We will study the IIHS test results with these objectives in mind."
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