Thread: If the Soul had a love child with a Smart...

If you want this small, you could spring for something nicer like the Scion iQ.. but these vehicles are just too tiny for me!

^^ exactly. These Smart and Fiat things are not much bigger than those red and yellow push cars I used to have when I was little. Same design and safety features too LOL. My Barbie Jeep was safer than one of these SMART cars.

These tiny cars are fuel efficient, economic death traps, IMO. You hit something head on, regardless of speed, you're prolly deceased. A 45mph head crash is likely an end gamer in these little Fiats, Smarts, IQs and whatever else.

Big NOPE for me.

[Sent from my Nexus 7. Pardon errors.]

WTF is up with all the thread revivals over the past week? Thread necrophiliacs..

Originally Posted by fatabbot

WTF is up with all the thread revivals over the past week? Thread necrophiliacs..

Newbies with a lot of time on their hands.

Originally Posted by EboniLM

^^ exactly. These Smart and Fiat things are not much bigger than those red and yellow push cars I used to have when I was little. Same design and safety features too LOL. My Barbie Jeep was safer than one of these SMART cars.

These tiny cars are fuel efficient, economic death traps, IMO. You hit something head on, regardless of speed, you're prolly deceased. A 45mph head crash is likely an end gamer in these little Fiats, Smarts, IQs and whatever else.

Big NOPE for me.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, personal preference, and risk tolerance, but modern minis/micros (smart, iQ, Fiat 500, MINI) are a far cry from a "death trap." If they were, reported fatalities would be much higher than average and insurance costs would be outrageous. Of course, neither of those things are true from the data that's been published, at least for the smart. Last time I looked, actual reported fatalities in the smart (NHTSA FARS), were lower than average and insurance costs are dirt cheap for me at least (cheaper than the Soul). And, insurance companies don't cut you a break on their vehicle ratings because they like you. IIHS insurance loss statistics show that the smart specifically has lower than average payout rates when involved in accidents, hence the lower ratings.

I won't claim that the smart is safer than a larger, modern car (it isn't), but a death trap it is not and the active/passive safety systems packed into it are impressive. People can and will die in all makes and models. IMHO, riding a motorcycle or bicycle in traffic would be tantamount to "death trap," but hey, if that's someone's cup of tea, fits their risk threshold, and they want to pay the insurance, then so be it. On the smart forum we've had folks T-boned by F-150s, smarts driven into trees, rolled, etc. Many of those people went out and bought another smart afterward. Mercedes designs vehicles for repeat buyers.

P.S. Before anyone trots out the bogus pictures circulating the Internet of supposedly smashed smart cars, you'll have to check your facts (Snopes) and look for 3 lug nuts. If the smashed vehicle has more than 3, it's not a smart of any generation - that's one easy giveaway. The infamous picture from Louisiana of a vehicle smashed between two trucks was a Ford Escape (according to Snopes) and certainly has more than 3 lugs regardless.

It seems that about half of a Smart Car is a single-piece roll-cage that doubles as the car's frame. Seems safe enough to me, for urban driving. Not sure I'd want to take it on the road for any distance, though.

It does indeed, and it emulates a NASCAR roll cage.

'pini