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-   -   Alto rear-ended by an Amaze: See the results (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/street-experiences/152782-alto-rear-ended-amaze-see-results-4.html)

First of all, you cant really judge the damage to the Alto just by looking at the bumper from the outside. Both the bumpers are made of plastic, hence they are flexible, therefore pop out back into place and often give people an illusion that nothing has happened to the vehicle. I have seen cases where after front impact, the bumper that particular looked almost perfect, except for some scratches whereas later on, it so happened that the A/c condensor, fan and the radiator was damaged.

Secondly, seems that the area between the lights-grille-bonnet end of the Amaze came in contact with rear cross member of the Alto. Therefore the visible damage to the Amaze and if so, the Alto's rear cross member will be damaged under the bumper, not externally visible.


In such a situation, and more importantly in a frontal collision, one should asses the damage only after removal of the bumpers, which are flexible and always gives the illusion that nothing happened. I'm sure the Alto is damaged quite a bit, but thats under the skin!

Not meaning to hijack this thread .. My swift got rear ended Last December . it was rear ended by a Maruti Omni belonging to an eminent construction company here . Had an argument with the driver which cooled down and let him go ( there is a lot between the argument and cooling down part , that's a long story ). next morning dropped my car for repair , got the estimate and shot a mail to the owners of the Omni . Long story short - they paid !

Last year my alto was rear ended too by an i20, the guy hit me right at the rear licence plate. I had to replace my rear bumper and hatch door by claiming insurance, his 2 month old car suffered a broken bumper and a completely bent bonnet. I was amazed my puny alto could unleash such hell on a gigantic i 20:)

With so many instances of rear ending coming up on team bhp, i wonder how will the younger sibling of Amaze, the Brio with a glass back fare when hit by another vehicle :Shockked:The glass shards can just fly and hit the rear passengers causing serious injury! Honda claim its toughened glass but if a sheet of metal can bend this way, can glass be any better?

Poor amaze looks in an amazingly bad shape! Your alto sure has taken a banging, but thanks to the maruti build, even your fiber bumper is stronger and better as compared to the sheet metal of the amaze.
I wonder, how such cars are termed safer than other cars.
:OT It would have been more interesting, had you been driving an 90's Amby :D

The damage to the Amaze front end was for two reasons:
1. Pedestrian safety norms that need the panels to absorb more of the impact forces, rather than transfer them to the pedestrian hit
2. The crumple zones are non rigid, absorbing the forces by changing shape, rather than transmitting the same forces to the passengers in the cabin.

That said, I'm glad no one got hurt.

Sam

It is a very incorrect notion that heavy sheet metal and strong bumper that does not deform means that a car is safe. I have nothing against manufacturers using heavy sheet metal. I love the tank like build quality of my dad's Palio.

However, we need to understand that thicker sheet metal that does not deform on impact simply means that the energy generated due to impact is being transferred to the cabin and other parts of the car.

In a relatively mild collision, like the case being discussed here, the passengers get away safely as there isn't enough impact/energy to cause damage to the cabin. But in a case of a severe collision, a car with good crumple zones will cause the entire car (except the cabin) to deform severely, channeling the impact along the sides and protecting the occupants.

However, a car designed with crumple zones will crumple even in a minor collision and will thus give a feeling that poor sheet metal is used.

I am not implying that cars using heavy sheet metal do not have good crumple zones. A car with heavy metal and good crumple zones is a bonus. e.g. Polo. The only point I am trying to make is that a polo with good sheet metal will look bad if it collides with an old Ambassador as it will crumple along the crumple zones to reduce/ prevent impact of collision from getting into the cabin.

The Honda Amaze is designed to meet the new pedestrian safety standards, which results in easy to deform sheet-metal on the bonnet and other components like the grille and bumper. This also means that in the case of a frontal impact, the passengers are do not undergo an unreasonable magnitude of deceleration, as the car allows for a controlled crumpling of the crash rails.
It is common to find people think that a car that barely has any damage after an impact is a "solid" car and that the "build quality" is great. This is exactly the opposite of what you, a passenger would want.
One must place passenger safety above the vehicle, when it comes to designing for a crash. You sacrifice the car, to ensure you can walk out scratch free(hopefully). :)

On the subject of bumpers (especially after seeing your photos), I was having a chat with a small group of mechanics outside the VW A.S.S. while waiting to take delivery of my Polo after servicing. I was cribbing to them a bit about how 'modern' cars all seem to have fragile bumpers that pop out / break hinges at the slightest contact. They all seemed to be in agreement that this occurs more when the hit is from an angle (near corner) and in head-on collisions the apparently frail plastic bumper can absorb some shock without dislocation.

Wow. The amaze guy had to pay a hefty fine for his negligent driving. Glad to know you and the other occupants of the car are safe.

Well, on this very stretch, we had a similar incident a few years back, when I was travelling with my friend in his Mazda RX-8, when a Dzire rear ended our car as he could not brake in time. Luckily, only the bumper got a ,minor dent and no further damages.

It is good to hear that no one was injured in this incident.Hopefully your alto gets fixed soon at a reasonable price.
That being said, I wish someone here with sufficient knowledge about the structure of cars and behaviour of crumple zones in modern cars will write a thread about how they are designed to absorb and distribute the impact keeping the passengers relatively safe. There is a lot of misconception about build quality of modern cars especially after reading cases of cars rear ending another car. A thread dedicated to this topic will be very helpful I think.

Now back to the topic in discussion, in july 2011 my Indica was part of a pile up on the road near juinagar rly. station on the sion panvel highway. Sequence was wagon r- wagon r - honda city(dolphin body) - my indica. The wagon r came to a dead stop on the right most lane as the Piagioo Ape in front of him hit a bump and the metal bar that acts as its bumper fell off. Result was the 2nd,3rd and 4th cars hitting and the wagon r at fault got away with no damage :Frustrati
My car took damage to the bumper,bonnet,left headlight housing,compressor and radiator. For the front of the honda city it was a damaged bumper and radiator. Rear damage to the city and wagon r was a damaged bumper and the metal frame behind the bumper being pushed inside. Now the visible damage on the front of the honda city was far greater than my indica, though in reality my indica with the thicker sheet metal suffered more damage internally.
So there must be a design philosophy that the impact be absorbed by the frame and sheet metal to save other components and cabin.

Guys just saw the pics and it looks like it is an amaze E "I-DTEC". Now, as far as I know all Amaze diesel models come with ABS as a basic safety measure. So why couldn't he control his car?

Guys, a few months back an Innova taxi rear-ended my Brother-in-law's Aria. The effects were similar to this case. The innova had extensive damage viz, headlights, grill, bonnet, radiator damaged etc. But the Aria only had a bent exhaust tail pipe. To this day that tail pipe is slightly bent.

What I am thinking is that the front end is designed to crumple, while the rear exposes the chasis soon after the bumper bends in. Of course ABS+EBD always helpful. Both the Innova and this Amaze did not have ABS/EBD.

Not really. I had a Meru's Logan hit the rear left side of my OHC while I was completely standstill and he was probably doing 40kmph or so. He had minor dent on his bumper and front left fender while the damage on OHC rear left was enormous.
I guess it would depend on where the car gets hit. If a structural member of one vehicle hits the non-structural part of other the damage would be more to the later.

OK, that's a good input, I stand corrected.