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Teaos wrote:I bet the suit heads writting the law expected the premiums of all the groups to drop is men pay what women used to.

But I bet my left nut that women just end up paying more. The only people who will benifit from this law is insurance companies.

That's what most of us cynics would expect, but things can't happen that way. This is bad business for large mutual insurers, and a death-knell for small ones. While skeptical thinking would agree with you, the fact is that insurers have to compete - even if the baseline goes up. If one company lower's men's rates - or even brings women's and men's rates to meet in the middle - then no other insurance company can do anything but the same. In America, at least, most types of life or P&C have a cap on the margin of premiums anyway.

I had another thought - bear in mind that "C" is the largest part of "P&C" insurance. Does anyone have a link to some hard data on medical expenses and accidental death benefits rated against total licensed drivers for any or all European countries? The prevalence of unregulated roads and teeny, tiny little cars may play a huge role in the cost of auto insurance over there. In what seems like a typical auto in much of Europe, one's best hope in a crash at highway speed would seem to be to hit something hard enough to not have to limp away.

I'm pretty sure our safety standards are way more stringent than American ones, on that front. If that's what you meant anyway.

Reliant121 wrote:I'm pretty sure our safety standards are way more stringent than American ones, on that front. If that's what you meant anyway.

Do you mean in manufacturing, traffic regulation, or what? In any event; a smaller, lighter car will always fare worse when hitting a given object at a given speed than a larger, heavier one. "Five-star" crash safety rating doesn't always mean "five-star," as those determinations are made in tests which model the subject vehicle against an object of the same size and weight. Obviously, the five-star-rated Smart will not fare as well when hitting a semi-rig as it will when hitting another Smart.

I was speaking more generally about Europe, though, not just about England or even the whole of the UKoGBaNI.

Not strictly true. Most modern EU cars are designed with a billion different systems so that the energy is dissipated away from the person involved. Now the car is generally absolutely totaled. But the person, at least in modern cars, isn't that harmed. Gotta remember that everything is smaller for us, even our large scale lorries (i'm assuming a "semi-rig" is something roughly equivalent to a lorry), most of our industrial vehicles are smaller, the mass of the vehicles in question is smaller. Plus, most of the smaller cars aren't designed for motor-ways cause they are bought by people who never need to, and it's entirely feasible that someone can live happily without ever touching a motor-way.

Also, from what I've seen on youtube, we generally drive a lot more gently than American roads.

As for the smart, who even buys a smart car anymore?

Reliant121 wrote:(i'm assuming a "semi-rig" is something roughly equivalent to a lorry)

It's another name for an artic.

Also, from what I've seen on youtube, we generally drive a lot more gently than American roads.

We've also got decent driving tests. It obviously varies between states, but some US driving tests are little more than a spin round the block.

As for the smart, who even buys a smart car anymore?

The un-smart.

"Five-star" crash safety rating doesn't always mean "five-star," as those determinations are made in tests which model the subject vehicle against an object of the same size and weight.

No, they don't. They're absolute measures not relative ones. Obviously if a Smart picks a fight with an artic it's going to come second, but that sort of thing is incorporated into the tests.

Mikey wrote:I was speaking more generally about Europe, though, not just about England or even the whole of the UKoGBaNI.

Safety standards are pretty much harmonised across the EU.

Overall, our cars and yours are probably about the same, if only because of the sheer mass of yours. Your roads are probably safer though , at least out in the country - you've got enough space so if you go off the road you'll usually have plenty of run-off. Over here if you go off you're likely to OD on tree or similar obstacle.

I'm pretty sure Yank Artics are considerably larger than ours, maybe mistaken.

There's also the standard driving road you'd find. People buy the car that suits there needs. If I went out and bought something like a a Toyota Aygo or a smart fortwo, I would barely ever go on a motorway or ever need to go on a motorway meaning i'd barely ever encounter an artic or something similar. I'm fairly sure that for many Americans, just going to the shop means going onto a dual-carriageway or a motorway let alone going to work. A lot of jobs that require someone to go long distance here give a company car which is generally much larger and safer, at least Focus sized more likely to be a Mondeo equivalent.

Reliant121 wrote:Most modern EU cars are designed with a billion different systems so that the energy is dissipated away from the person involved.

That's global. Even a Tata will have laminate windshields, crumple zones, etc.; and even things like sequential breakaway engine mounts are becoming more commonplace in cars manufactured for every global market.

Reliant121 wrote:i'm assuming a "semi-rig" is something roughly equivalent to a lorry

Yes, as Seafort said it refers to an eighteen-wheeler/tractor-trailer/"articulated lorry:"

Captain Seafort wrote:No, they don't. They're absolute measures not relative ones. Obviously if a Smart picks a fight with an artic it's going to come second, but that sort of thing is incorporated into the tests.

You're absolutely wrong. Perhaps the UKoGBaNI or the EU as a whole uses a different organization, but NHTSA/IIHS frontal impact tests are based on crashing the car into a wall. I can't find the link anymore, but when I was in auto retail I had training in this specific area and recall watching the visible differences in the crash tests of two disparate "5-star" rated vehicles... and the difference was night and day.

Captain Seafort wrote:The un-smart.

And the small. I'm only 5'8" and about 160 lbs., and I couldn't sit confortably in one.

Reliant121 wrote:Also, from what I've seen on youtube, we generally drive a lot more gently than American roads.

In the UK perhaps, but aren't there still a lot of roads without speed limits in Europe?

Mikey wrote:In the UK perhaps, but aren't there still a lot of roads without speed limits in Europe?

Fecking all of them if other drivers are anything to go by

Reliant121 wrote:I'm pretty sure Yank Artics are considerably larger than ours, maybe mistaken.

Maybe so, but ours are infinitely superior to theirs. Why? Because most of theirs have the engine block sticking out in front of the cab, while ours are mostly cab-over-engine. Which does this look like? 8)

For the speed limits, not at all. There are a few autobahns in germany where the speed limit is "The maximum a given vehicle can facilitate" but they are generally two lane roads, and so cars rarely go faster than a normal limit.

That truck that Mikey posted is absolutely huge. Thats got to be bigger than an Artic.

The impact tests are only one in a huge multitude of NCAP tests, many of which deal with motorway speed tests, collision with blah blah tests, you name it. NCAP is highly extensive.

As for the smart-car, they are infinitely rare because they are expensive. And still are rarely taken onto the motorway.

Reliant121 wrote:I'm pretty sure Yank Artics are considerably larger than ours, maybe mistaken.

Here's a 1977 Freightliner cab-over, similar to ones I grew up in the first 3 years of my life.



Don't know if that's significantly bigger than what you guys have, but assuming that guy is a standard 1.8 meters, it offers a good sense of scale of American semis.

Seafort - funny you'd mention cab-overs right while I was posting this.

Now that one, Tsu, looks much smaller. At least in height.

This is a typical artic

And this is the front of one of them:

Captain Seafort wrote:Maybe so, but ours are infinitely superior to theirs. Why? Because most of theirs have the engine block sticking out in front of the cab, while ours are mostly cab-over-engine. Which does this look like?

Maybe you were just trying to fit in a Transformers reference, but again you're misinformed. While long-nose cabs are probably slightly more popular over here, cab-overs are still a relevant presence - in both standard and sleeper cabs. Especially considering the fact that those engines can go significantly over a million miles, then get refurbished and resold; and the 12-hi-lo trans and radiators sometimes get rebuilt 3 - 5 times, it takes a real road dog to take one of those out of service. With the prevalence of autosticks in hi-lo trans, they last even longer.

@ Reliant - that pick looks pretty much the same size as a standard (non-sleeper) cab-over 'round here.

In straight jobs (box trucks, non-articulated trucks of 80k - 120k lbs, GVWR or less,) there is a far more significant presence in the cab-over style. One of the most popular trucks in the medium-duty market is the Isuzu NQR/GMC-Chevy W-series and their competitors:


They have a tighter turning radius than many passenger sedans, are supremely easy to drive, and can take almost anything from service/utility bodies to dumps to beavertails to box bodies.