American cars didn’t rank among the top picks in the Institute for Highway Safety’s Top Safety Pick survey, released Tuesday.
Japanese car makers were the big winners this year with six spots from Honda and Fuji Heavy Industries. Winners this year were required to have electronic stability control (ESC). Pickups were not included because the Institute hasn’t yet evaluated their side crash resistance.
The Ford five Hundred and Mercury Montego faired well in their test performance, however, since neither model offers ESC, they were not included on the list. There were no small cars included in this year’s list, also due to the lack of ESC.
Three of the 13 winning vehicles for 2007 were from Honda, including an Acura SUV. Three winners were from Subaru. Audi redesigned the seat/head restraints in the A4 and A6 to improve performance in the Institute's rear test. Subaru accelerated plans to offer ESC on some versions of the Forester and Legacy.
Recent Institute research found that ESC reduces the risk of serious crashes involving both SUVs and cars. The largest effect is in single-vehicle crashes, which were reduced 40 percent with the addition of ESC. Fatal single-vehicle crashes went down 56 percent, and fatal rollovers of cars and SUVs were reduced by about 80 percent.
The Institute's frontal crash evaluations are based on results of frontal offset crash tests at 40 mph.
Top picks included the Audi A6 manufactured after November 2006 in the large car category and the Audi A4 in the mid-sized category. The Hyundai Entourage won for the minivan group and the Mercedes M Class won for the luxury SUV category.
The entire report can be read by clicking here.