Understeer is easier for the average driver to cope with than oversteer, but I think they overdid it a bit. Most people who mod their Smarts at all start by putting wider equal sized tyres all around. I hear they’ve improved this on the current generation car.
Bolding mine, I actually thought that part of the article is disingenuous.
First of all the Smart is a city car, meaning it’s designed for the corners of the USA that do not have wide open parking lots. City drivers parallel park on the street, even if you discount perpendicular parking, the 9-foot long Smart car is still going to be easier to park than your typical American compact.
Also, not all city streets are metered (including Manhattan), and you are also seeing cities pick up ‘Pay at the box’ parking meters (muni meters in NYC) With this system there are no stripes to mark out spots, if you can squeeze in at the curb then you are legally parked.
I’m not saying this is a reason to buy a Smart car, but can’t imagine how ease of parking wouldn’t be an advantage in a 9 foot car. My Focus hatchback is a smidge over 14’, it only gives me a foot off a typical sedan but on a regular bases those last few inches are the difference between squeezing myself in or circling the block again. Another five feet off would be a dream, I’m rather surprised that a reporter for the NY Times would discount the difference.
Yah, I don’t think so. I have a front crush zone, a back seat, and a trunk. The Smart car has a slot behind the seat to hold envelopes. Even the tree huggers don’t like it. quote:
"once at speed, the engine thrashed and the car was buffeted by the wake of passing tractor trailers, giving me pause when I thought about taking one hand off the wheel.
and here is the gas mileage they got (which is below my combined average):
Finally, the biggest disappointment came in the mileage department, where the writer averaged 32 miles per gallon for two tankfuls of gas, which is below the EPA’s estimate of 36 m.p.g. for combined city/highway driving.
Keep in mind it takes premium fuel.
All of which will do no good in the highway-speed impact you speculatively provided. Plus, the Hummer driver is almost certainly dead, too, from the deceleration alone, if by some miracle nothing else gets him.
My Toyota Echo runs just fine on 87 octane. And with the new EPA numbers, it gets a combined mileage of 33 mpg, which fits my observations.
You can get a low mileage used one for under six grand.
I’ve hit a parked car at 65 mph in a Ford Escort. Not only did I walk away unscratched but the car was driveable and subsequently repaired.
I gave a real world scenario in the US. I’m surrounded by SUV’s and Semi’s on the highway. In the real world you would be pulling the engine of a Smart Car out of your ass in a rear end collision.
No game involved. I would rather be hit by school bus in a Hummer than a Smart Car. But in the real world I can’t drive a school bus around. It’s not practical. And I don’t know the statistics on steamroller accidents but I imagine they’re the same for train impacts on the highway. Your examples are just nonsense.
In the real world I would rather drive a Saturn that gets better gas mileage around town, has room for 4 people, a trunk that holds all my groceries, a large crush zone front and back, and runs on regular gas. The transmission in my car shifts silky smooth, I have better acceleration, and I don’t get buffeted on the highway by trucks. I can also get parts anywhere in the country as well as the mechanical expertise to fix it.
Did you look at the video posted above? Granted 70 mph into a cement barrier is different than my Escort at 65 mph into another car but my car was repairable. The Smart car was destroyed and the driver would have died. There is almost no crush zone to the car. It doesn’t matter how strong the cage is if all the force is transmitted to it. The deceleration would have been brutal.
This discussion is silly. The Smart car has one, and only one advantage going for it, but it’s a big one: It’s extremely small.
If you see it and think: “That car is so small! At last parking will not be so much of a problem!” then you might be in the target market for this car.
If you see it and think anything else, like: “That car is so small! I wonder how it performs.” Or: “That car is so small! I wonder how it good its mileage is.” Or: “That car is so smal! I wonder how safe it is.” then you are not in the target market for this car.
People in Europe who are buying it are doing it for one reason only: it can fit into their tiny parking spaces. Other than that it is no more than an adequate car.
If you are not worried about parking in tiny spaces, there is no reason for you to buy this car. But if you ARE worried about that, this could be the car you’ve been waiting for.
Ed
You mean the one I posted?
Yes, indeed it is different.
I can see the advantage when you have parallel parking for sure, but I have to wonder about why you would own this car under other circumstances. For instance, I work in a pricey suburb, and I’ve seen two different people driving these cars around town. The parking here consists of three types: 1) parking lots, 2) perpendicular street spots, with a few blocks that have parallel but painted-in/metered slots, and 3) private driveways/garages, which includes I’m sure 99.99% of all the homes here. This suburb is far enough away from the city that it wouldn’t be practical to drive a car that you can’t take on the expressway. And if the gas mileage isn’t that great, what’s the point?
Yeah, maybe the front tires were where the driver’s legs would’ve been, but did your see that the windshield was barely cracked and he could still open the door? That’s a SAFE car! 
I think you’re right on this accord. Which makes me wonder why they have dealers in cities such as Minneapolis. Parking is not a problem, the metro is spread out and connected by freeways, and we have snow.
I can’t figure out why this car seems to make people angry. There are dozens of cars I’m sure I’ll never buy, but I’m not going to start a message board thread about them either.
Some people don’t want to have to buy a car to get labeled as “smart” while they are busy bashing SUV owners for being “dumb”. It hurts their feelings.
I’m under no illusions I’ll get a BJ for buying an H2. 
I’m arguing that when you look at actual safety, there’s very little positive correlation between car mass and real world deaths. 1 ton will beat out 10 tons because the 1 ton doesn’t roll over nearly as often.
Not if it transmits the energy to the occupant. Which is discussed in the video. It clearly shows more damage to the Smart Car. The leg room is gone.
Then why do they advertise it as a “Hummer”? False advertising, I say! I want a refund!
I notice you did not address the rollover issue which is a huge problem with SUVs.
Look I don’t have a dog in this hunt, but people that think that that mass is the end all and be all of automotive safety are wrong. On a message board dedicated to fighting ignorance you can’t expect such ignorant statements to go unchallenged. If mass was the end all of automotive safety, then '59 Caddys would be the safest car out there. Two and a half tons of stout Detroit iron. :rolleyes:
Personally I think the Smart Car is a pretty terrible car. I would not buy one as it does not meet my needs. However I will not demonize it for being unsafe unless someone can produce evidence to the contrary. Saying what if it gets rear ended by an M1A1 Abrams is not evidence. It is pulling scenarios out of your ass. Show objective test data that can and is reproduced on other vehicles, like I did with the IIHS data.
In other words, when come back bring cite.
I agree with you. My wife loves this car and as soon as it was available here she has put our name on the waiting list. Car purchases aren’t always rational and in this case for her it is not. She just ‘likes’ the car. And for what she wants to use it for it is a great choice. She wants a little commuter car to go to the grocery store and to and from the ferry out where we live. All on country roads with maximum speeds of 40 mph. She is very safety conscious and she has read enough to be satisfied. It has had good ratings, not great, but it is certainly not considered, as far as I can tell, by any credible ratings board as an unsafe vehicle.
The bottom line is for her it is what she wants and it meets her needs. I find it rather humorous how people try to demonize this car. It doesn’t seem rational, but cars rarely make people rational. I remember growing up I was the first in my family to buy a car that wasn’t a Ford—you would have thought for awhile I was the anti-christ :smack: But eventually other brothers purchased vehicles that weren’t Fords. I have a friend who owns like 8 miatas. Now I like miata’s and even own one, but if I am going to own 8 cars they sure as hell aren’t all going to be the same damn car! But hey to each their own is my motto.
But until someone can post defendable data that supports a theory that this car is unsafe I will have to take their opinion with a huge grain of salt.