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Date:         Tue, 5 Sep 1995 14:35:10 -0500
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         mbushore@icaen.uiowa.edu
Subject:      safety/liability questions

I am fortunate in that I get to write a paper having somethiung to do with product liability. The main basis (hopefully) is going to be that some cases involving accidents are utilizing technologies to reconstruct the accidents that are more advanced than the technologies that were available to design the vehicle at the time it was built.

More specifically: There was a case of a VW Thing overturning during an evasive manuveur. Based on a computer simulation, the accident could have been avoided if VW had designed the thing with a CG 1 inch lower. The article I read also briefly discussed the lack of roll bar, etc.

What I am wondering/needing is some feelings on how individual people make decisions to compensate for the obvious design comprimises that some types of vehicles have. For instance, has anyone ever noticed that a VW bus has a short nose? How do you compensate for this when you drive? Or do you? Should the driver/buyer of a vehicle be aware of the shortcomings of the vehicle when they buy it and adjust their behavior accordingly? (i.e. not drive their Van like it was a Porsche)

Thanks for any ideas/responses, and sorry if I bored anyone. For anyone interested, Volkswagens get mentioned more times than any other car make when we discuss product liability in class....

<Matt ..


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