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-   -   2019 Global NCAP crash tests - Ertiga, WagonR, Santro & Redigo (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/road-safety/214621-2019-global-ncap-crash-tests-ertiga-wagonr-santro-redigo-4.html)

What is the use of scoring a single star or a double star? You can't even talk about it or use it for any marketing purpose. In fact you are telling your customers that you are only one star safe. I have a question! Tata Nexon is at the top with 5 Stars, (now for 13 months running unchallenged). The New Tata Nexon with minor model changes is coming in 2020. Will it have to undergo the same tests again to reconfirm its position?

Eon did not score any stars. In fact, you may feel a little better about the Santro if you watch GNCAP's videos of testing both these cars - Santro's passenger compartment remained pretty much intact. Moreover, you should take solace that you have recommended a good car in its segment. As far as I can recall even its pricier sibling Grand i10 fared poorly in crash tests.

Isn't auto door locks a safety feature? Why should removing it improve the score?

Polo scores 4 stars? Every VW sales person starts his pitch uaing "it's a 5 star safety rating car".

The Zest scoring 4 stars is remarkable. Hasn't been publicized and appreciated enough, if at all. That wouldn't have made much difference to the sale charts thought. Most would still buy dzire over zest.

May be the answer lies in your question itself - Ertiga is compromising on structural integrity in order to offer a lot more real estate than the similarly priced Brezza. A 7-seater MPV almost at the price of a 5-seater compact SUV - some corner cutting is inevitable.

Auto door locks is not a "crash" safety feature that GNCAP rates. As per NCAP, if a car has auto (speed sensing) door locks, they should also unlock automatically in case of an accident. Apparently there were issues in the unlock part which were not fixed in 100% cases and had bugs. I refuse to buy that, I suspect they used this opportunity to save a few bucks and also make the car have some feature less than the higher trim Harrier for premium segment distinguishing. No cane no flute type of a solution. :Frustrati

The Tiago/Tigor are also getting their BCM updated to remove the auto door locks because they are also aspiring for 5 star GNCAP rating. Solid build and safety performance is the USP pitch for TML decisively. Let's see how the market receives that.

The difference lies in the platform on which the Ertiga and Vitara Brezza is based upon.

Ertiga uses the lightweight HEARTECT platform which is shared with the WagonR, Ignis, Swift and Baleno. No wonder Ertiga feels light just like its hatchback siblings.
While Vitara Brezza uses the Suzuki's global C-platform.

From our official review of Vitara Brezza:
I'd say Vitara Brezza is one car to grab if you need a long lasting as well as a safe Maruti in your garage. Hope it comes in petrol as soon as possible. It will be my pick over the Swift and Baleno.

Surely Maruti has the in house engineering expertise to know what score they would achieve when the Ertiga and Wagon R cars were tested. I strongly suspect Maruti has costing simulators built on analytical models that would show the increasing cost they would incur for engineering their platforms to be more safe against the corresponding increase in sales from safer cars. We as customers need to be a lot more discerning with our money when it comes to automobile safety.

Hyundai on the other hand, is a far more interesting story because just this month, one of India's leading automotive publications has run a story on their joint partnership with Hyundai for a safety campaign. The magazine has mentioned how Hyundai has made sure that "safety was well rooted in it's DNA right from the beginning". This however fails to explains how the i20 lost two stars when it became the Elite i20. It also leaves the low score of the new Santro as a major contradiction to this supposedly well entrenched Hyundai DNA.

The article also made a special note of how "their structural rigidity and solid build quality is very reassuring - especially on our chaotic and unpredictable roads.". Maybe the Global NCAP report which calls the structure of the Santro, unstable, will open the eyes of the magazine team and result in some much needed introspection.

These are usually paid PR campaigns to build perceptions and sway the uninformed customers.

My unpopular opinion would be that, all the cars have better than expected overall structure compared to the previous zero star cars that made headlines world wide.

Problem with these two and one star cars seems to be bad seat and seatbelt design! Dummy seems to be throw around a lot than expected.

Without question! Every month, the same magazine has a number of pages dedicated to "Special Features" which is basically a tie up with different manufacturers to feature their cars being driven to different parts of the country.

It's a shame that a 7 seater MPV has performed poorly in the Global NCAP test. Heartect platform has performed very poorly with respect to safety. Let's hope that Maruti move to a new platform for their next generation cars and ditch the poor Heartect platform

What's even more scary is that the supposedly "premium" XL6 would have similar performance with respect to safety.

Maruti - Pull your socks up and improve the safety of your cars.

I wonder whether there are subtle structural differences between Ertiga and XL6. Maruti claims that XL6 has "Suzuki-TECT" body but does not mention so for Ertiga. TECT may or may not improve safety for XL6 as we know that GNAP found the TECT body of African spec Ignis unstable.

This is what I had posted regarding the differences between XL6 and Ertiga.

https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/india...ml#post4654699


Even I was curious to know what earned the XL6 SUZUKI-TECT badge which all NEXA cars get and only Vitara Brezza gets in the Arena lineup. I'm not sure what difference the different panels and members would have but I'm hoping it has a positive effect over the Ertiga.

Regards,
Shashi

It works both ways. GNCAP picks up cars as per market relevance, and also manufacturers can choose to sponsor their cars and get them tested as well.

In both cases, the actual car is picked up by the NCAP body from the open market.

Problem is lack of awareness in average buyers & segments of cars. This is what I feel overall -

1. Maruti is fully entitled to sell whatever cars they want to sell. Nothing wrong if they sell cars that score 0 on GNCAP.
2. Customers should choose what their priorities are before buying a car.
3. If safety on high speeds is a requirement, they MUST have GNCAP performance in their list of requirements.
4. We shouldn't expect Maruti to sell an Alto or similar car with 5 Star GNCAP rating. Not possible at the cost at which these cars sell.
5. But as customers, we shouldn't then buy these cars to do 120kmph on a highway.
6. Its fine to buy a lower safety rated car if its going to be used exclusively in the confines of a crowded city for running errands in jam packed lanes and roads. 5 or 0 stars won't make a difference.
7. As long as people make calculated buying decisions, sales figures will reflect the same. When Maruti sees customer preference shifting & sales sliding, they'll start making cars that perform better on GNCAP. They already do - Brezza for instance is good!
8. Its not just Maruti. Hyundai has done poorly with the Santro too. So it all applies to all car makers really.

We saying car makers should improve is still from a fraction of the customer base. Education is still needed. Its good that initiatives like GNCAP are now bringing that awareness in customers. In another few years, safety will be a very important factor in people's mind. Thankfully.