Theairbagwas a major improvement in automotive refuge when it was first introduce in the 1970s . As you ’re probably aware , their use has only grown . Since the late 1990s , all vehicles create in the United States must have both gadget driver and rider side front airbags . Today , we also have side drapery airbags , tubelike airbags , even knee airbags . Some companies have even part testing exterior airbags to protect pedestrian . It seems as if we ’re not that far from a car ’s midland bursting into one giant inflated shock on wallop . Sounds beneficial , but trade-off bristle : How much extra weighting and cost can you work up into a fresh car ?
To answer this question , you must first understand how airbags work . The basic front airbag is designed to slow the acceleration of a railway car ’s occupants during impact , reducing the force acting on them and preventing trauma . Side airbags do the same thing , but they protect resident from side impact . pall or tubular airbags protect the caput from slam into the side ; while airbags climb in the rear or the doorway protect the pelvis .
Other airbags in development mostly help to hold the occupants safely during crash . Take the human knee airbag , for example . Many cars have big padded human knee bolsters that protect legs from crash impact . However , a sudden stop send out a someone ’s wooden leg discard forward . When they strike something , the violence is concentrated on one area of the branch . The result can be a hard peg break and damage to the hips or pelvis . A articulatio genus airbag either replaces the bolster or sits behind it . On impact , the airbag blow up and presses the occupants ' knees back against the crushed part of the seat , keeping them safely in place . Other new airbag designs keep masses from slue down in their seats , or shift an resident ’s place away from the wallop [ source : Moore ] .
Protection is a good affair , especially while driving ; however , how much is too much ? Can a elevator car actually be too safe to labour ? Let ’s regain out on the next page .
Airbag Limitations
Technically , there ’s no upper limit to the number ofairbagsyou could place in a vehicle . A car could be designed with every midland airfoil ready to inflate during wallop ; however , that vehicle would be very expensive and very heavy . Cost and weight – those are the two main limits to the use of airbags .
The installation of airbags costs money for both the materials and labor . replace an airbag that has already been deployed can cost anywhere from $ 500 to several thousand dollar bill . They be significantly less when they ’re initially installed at the manufactory , but the price adds up quickly as more and more airbags are add together . For example , the side airbag option on a 2006 Ford Fusion adds almost $ 600 to the final cost of the car [ source : CBS News ] .
Extra weightiness is another trouble . Increased weight reducesfuel mileage . The U.S.Environmental Protection Agencyestimates that each 100 lbs . of weight added to a car subjugate mileage by two percent [ source : Fueleconomy.gov ] . While automakers do n’t typically release information about the weight unit of case-by-case components , and an individual airbag does n’t weigh very much , multiple airbags can significantly increase overall vehicle free weight . If you consider the airbag itself , the chemical substance propellent needed to inflate it , the wiring and detector , plus the enclosures for all the components , you could see that fill up a elevator car with a bunch of airbags would suffer yourfuel economy .
for certain , airbags may make your car slower and leaden , but there some definite advantages . We ’ll research those on the next page .
Are we better off with airbags?
There ’s really no disputation –airbagssave survive and deoxidize the severity of injuries . Data base oncrash testingand actual , veridical - worldly concern collapse , as well as study by the Department of Transportation and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety show that airbags better prophylactic [ source : Insurance Institute for Highway Safety ] . There ’s still a potent undertide of opposition to airbags , just as there was for mandatoryseatbelts , but the datum does n’t lie .
That ’s not to say that airbags are perfect . If used improperly , they can do wound or destruction . Children incar seatsshould not ride in the front hind end if the vehicle is fit out with an airbag , and drivers generally should not sit within ten in of the steering roulette wheel . Since 1990 , 290 airbag - stimulate deaths have occurred ; in the same sentence frame , however , airbags have saved more than 27,000 lives [ source : Insurance Institute for Highway Safety ] . Side airbags are even safe – no one has ever been drink down by one . Even in the worst case ( which can be counted on one deal ) they only cause minor injuries . In add-on , innovative front airbags have a safer , two - stage design . In depressed - speed collision , they blow up with less force , reduce the chance of accidental injury if a child or smaller somebody is in the front seat .
The price - effectiveness of airbags remains a topic of encompassing debate . Several studies have attempted to tabulate the cost of grow and installing airbags , the price of fuel associated with the superfluous weight and the cost of replacing used airbags . That total price is then compared to a numeric physical body representing the economic cost of deaths and injuries . The number that comes out out front seems irrelevant when someone you know was save from serious injury or death .
Indeed , airbags can even serve salve you money . Manyinsurancecompanies extend price reduction for vehicle with certain safety features – including airbags . This may seem counterintuitive , since the airbags total to the monetary value of quicken the vehicle . In fact , that supernumerary price often mean the vehicle will be write off instead of repaired . policy company also pay off to cover aesculapian bills resulting from injury , and those costs far preponderate the airbag replacement price .
For more entropy about airbag refuge and development , observe the links on the next Thomas Nelson Page .
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