First bump in a new S3...

OMFG! If it was me, I wouldn't be close to tears, but IN tears.
My respects to the owner... Maybe there's only minor damage to the engine and drivetrain. Driving in the snow must be terrible, I haven't tried that surface just yet, but with quattro should be more safe...
 
Tourist said:
Said he was turning in to the street on snow and the rear end kicked out.
Click to expand...
Complete rubbish IMHO. That's far too much damage for a minor shunt whilst pulling into a road, something doesn't add up there.
 
Vertigo1 said:
Complete rubbish IMHO. That's far too much damage for a minor shunt whilst pulling into a road, something doesn't add up there.
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My first thoughts too when I saw that. Modern cars are supposed to absorb minor damage, but the van the S3 has hit has very minor damage compared to the front of the S3. Still a real shame though.
 
Wonder if he had winter tyres on? Its hard to tell from the pictures.
 
I don`t think they are winter tyres, most Germans run winter tyres on steel rims or cheap aftermarket alloys.
 
benw123 said:
the van the S3 has hit has very minor damage compared to the front of the S3.
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My works van got rear ended when stationary by a car travelling at just under 30mph and the van was shortened by nearly 2ft as a result. The road junction outside of my office has at leat 1 accident a month and I see alot of shnts as a result.
Looks like the S3 wasn't travelling that quick at point of impact but braked hard, which caused the nose to go under the van causing the extensive damaged to the soft parts in the photos.

I'd be unconsolable if it were my S3!!:(
 
Looks minor to me, the chassis legs look ok. Remeber the air bags will go if the impact is harder than 18 mph into a solid object (aprox) and they have not gone.

Chris.
 
Problem is he's missed the bumper beam therefore all the energy has been absorbed by plastic grill and bonnet. It would have been quite a soft impact but clearly very messy. Bumper to bumper the van probably would have faired worse.

Helichris I'm impressed about your knowledge of airbag firing speeds.
 
Never needed one (touch wood), but I have been behind a car which had a head on ;-) The thing I remember most is the amount of smoke it generated, it looked like the car was on fire.

Also working in the car industry for a short time, but that was before the days of variable firing rates.

The air bag will deploy only when needed, and therefore it is possible to have a faster accident, hitting a softer object and not have it fire. You can also be hit from behind very hard with no deploy (don't ask how I know that).

Chris.
 
*****. too much speed. too little driving skill.
 
Basically the airbag will only fire if you're going so fast that your head would otherwise impact the steering wheel. With seatbelt pretensioners you have to be going at some speed these days for there to be any danger of this happening. 18mph actually seems rather low to me, I thought it was more like 30.
 
Don't test this, but hitting a solid object like a concrete block then its as low as 18mph, hitting another car would raise it to 30 I suppose because the other car will also absorbs some of the impact.

But i totally agree it's triggered buy the amount of deceleration force which would require your head to hit the wheel.

Lets hope all of us never need them anyway.

Chris.
 
Vertigo1 said:
Complete rubbish IMHO. That's far too much damage for a minor shunt whilst pulling into a road, something doesn't add up there.
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Just quoting what the driver of the S3 posted. :shrug:
 
Oh yeah I'm not claiming you're talking rubbish, rather that the driver was :)
 
I used to work as a crash engineer designing the safety performance of passenger cars. The lowest firing speed on unbelted occupants (americans) is around 12mph for 5th percentile, for belted around 20mph. This is for rigid barrier or poles. For deformable objects the speeds are 15-20mph (unbelted) and 30mph (belted) respectively. The most common reason to fire the airbag is to prevent neck injuries, rather than the head impact itself. Cars are not required to pass tests above 40mph, so all systems will be active above this speed.

As for damage, up to 5mph should be virtually invisible. 30mph would be virtually written off. I'd estimate this to be less 20mph.
 
Surely hitting the brakes wouldn't have had any effect with ABS (or whatever it's called these days)?
 
Shanked! Very thoughtful of the owner to post the photos on Kodak's online gallery. I've just ordered myself some nice A1 poster prints of the mayhem :photo:
 
Wonder if German insurance companies have "new for old" on cars under 1 year old like my policy?
I know I wouldnt want to keep a car that had been in a shunt like that.
 
Covenant said:
Wonder if German insurance companies have "new for old" on cars under 1 year old like my policy?
I know I wouldnt want to keep a car that had been in a shunt like that.
Click to expand...
Depending on your insurance company you can have "new for old" but only if the car is a economic write/off or if it stolen for good.
 
Covenant said:
Wonder if German insurance companies have "new for old" on cars under 1 year old like my policy?
I know I wouldnt want to keep a car that had been in a shunt like that.
Click to expand...

Old for New tends to kick in at 60% of purchase price to repair, and thats now where near bad enough for that.

looks at the chassis legs, no problems there, so is just a bolt on / off job, which is made cheap to repair by the manufactures to make car insurance cheaper.

Chris.
 
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