Own an old car? Want to put the fear of God in yourself for the commute back home this evening? Take a look at this clip:
Scary, huh? That was a 1978 Holden Commodore doing a fine job of proving the basic laws of physics.
It’s not quite as bad as it looks, though. Well, obviously it would be if you were in the driving seat of the Commodore, but this isn’t a standard crash test.
Our investigations reveal that this massive smash was carried out back in 1992 to test the limits of a new crash test facility. The Commodore was loaded with some 400kg of extra ballast in the footwells, and fired into the concrete wall at 62mph – faster than the normal NCAP test.
Still, there’s a Top Gear Top Tip in here somewhere: don’t crash your Commodore into a wall if you’ve half-filled it with sand.
Oh, and don’t crash your F4 Phantom jet fighter into a wall at 500mph:
62mph? Weak.
500mph? Not bad.
650mph? Now that’s more like it.
Son of a Beach
Thats some crazy (bed)Sheet(s)
Wow, the F4′s a case of Now you see it… now you don’t!!
Now they’re some damn good crash tests! LT, your crash test video is unbelievable! Most of the car was no where to be seen, incredible! And who would have thought that a ’78 Commodore with an extra 400kg on-board was so flimsy and brittle?
I wonder what an 18ton truck would look like if it smashed into a Metro at the speed of sound?
… And that F4 was just amazing! It kept going through the wall and never stopped! At 0:35 you can see the wings are still moving through the thick concrete wall.
Oh dear, that made a mess of that! The plane just disintergrated!
there not huge crashes but there expensive
thats probaly 10 zillion £ worth of damage (probley)
f1 crash mabey only 9 zillion?
a-n-y-w-a-y
back to the cheap Holden Commodore mega i did’t know that a car could just disappear like that
defo unsafe
so what’s the lesson ? don’t buy and crash a commodore ?? or a fighter jet ??? okay ! I’ll try my best..:D this is just lame ! where’s the jezza blog ? ps why did they use a car from the late70′s to test a crash facility built in 1992 ??? Some say people even buy cars after their ncap ratings… hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
It’s not that unrealistic though.
Think about it: 400kg extra in a car is equal to a tank of petrol and 4 people in the car. And 62 mph isn’t all that fast. So this is what your Commodore would look like if smashed it into a tree, you and your passengers would dead.
on second thought.. uhhh ha ha ha, ha ha ha, ha ha ha.. thhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaat woz coooooooool !
yuh-yuh he he he
uhhh… lets do it again !
dude.. do you have a commodore ? ha ha ha, ..can I ..borrow it ? ha ha ha, ha ha ha..:D
And TG has answered the age old riddle of just how does one make an F-4 Phantom disappear?
yuhhahahahaha ..yeah ! thin about it he he he, if you let us borrow it.. we’ll test it for ya hehehehehehehehe.. with SAND !
yeah, hahahahaha Sand is just like people ha ha ha, ..it’s dead weight ha ha ha ha ha…
..so can we like borrow it ?
hey !! is that your plane ?? he he he he he….
dude !! you missed a da-da he he he..
ssssssssssssssssssMACK !! SHUT UP Beavis !!!! ha ha ha
Oouch !! hehehehe.. it’s important hehehe.. you missed a chord ! he he he
hey ! a SANDpit !!!!
Where !?
..over there.. in that commodore…
hehehehehhehehehehe oh yeah ! he he he he he…
..and they were never seen again…
did they take hammond out first or not?
holey shit
had to laugh @ comment 18, nice one.
way to crash stuff, the phantom was a tad awesome.
the mythbusters bit was great to. “What car?” haha
The Holden test isn’t that unreal. As Vincentius said get 4 or 5 fully grown men in there loaded with gear travelling at say 40 mph and an oncoming truck at roughly the same speed and there you have your 2 foot long car after the crash.
..yez, relatively speaking (:P) you’re rite!
..really ?
YOU weren’t there MAN !
ah so.. four fully grown men ? wud zey fit into a little tank ???
Richard! THE COMMODORE…
peasents!
think about it ! crash tests are designed to be realsitic !!
..wow, yes, you’re qute right. wow !
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm mmmmmm mmmm mmm mmmmmmmm…
@ Vincentius (13) & Paxx (34)
Crash tests are always conducted with a full tank (of water) and with dummies that weigh as much as or possibly even more than a human being.
Now I know that the Holden in the video did not have any dummies on board, but…
Consider how the 400kg of ballast they put in the car would have a lot more inertia than dummies. A one kilo bag of sugar would not cause the same damage as a cast iron weight of the same mass travelling at the same speed. (I don’t know if this comparison is totally correct but I guess you understand what I’m trying to say)
Anyway, a crash at 62 mph would not be a pretty sight, whether the car is loaded with ballast or not. You would indeed be killed to death if you were in that Commodore instead of the ballast.
Can someone take down that F1 vid… actually showed Rolan Ratzenburgers fatal crash at Imola, the day before Senna died… I think it’s not appropriate to show that, sorry!
@ Lunchi
“… You would indeed be killed to death”, that’s an interesting comment, Captain Obvious.
Please explain to me just how could you be killed and not die?
I regret that my use of a quote from Mr. Jeremy Clarkson has failed. Or has been taken too seriously.
Safest place is clearly in the boot (or on the wing tip in the case of the plane). Of course you could always get crashed into from behind!
..and the roll cage is not cumpolsary becasue ? 3 point seatbelts because ? a more advanced drivers technique compliancy test for people traveling above 30mph ? And it might sound strange but an ejection seat system ? Making a 2 ton metal box that nowadays tends to “collapse” in all the right places with ballons exploding in your face and what other places that lobbyists might deem to be safe is a step up from no rules at all but puhlease… there is no safe way to crash if you don’t have the first clue what might happen if you brake and turn at the same time… and abs, esr and similar systems can’t always save you either they just try to correct your cockups ..as best as they were designed to… as someone once wrote speed doesn’t kill.. people do.
merlin, use your imagination:G ..it’s magic
@ABC
STOP POSTING ALL THOSE STUPID VIDEOS EVERYWHERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That is terrifying, look at this video of himalayan driving
sorry i forgot, but y exactly dont they put people in the cars when they do crash tests ?
After reviewing the footage:
Engineer 1 “hum, I think the crumple zone isn’t supposed to be the entire legnth of the car”
go away abc
Well the whole point is inertia isn’t it? Get a bigger truck and you’d have the same result.
That crash test was so scary but at the same time quite cool.
Don’t know about you but i’m tring to work out how it turns into dust.
wouldn’t want to be the person driving
Can somebody help? I’m writing a screenplay and need some info. Suppose a car is being driven at 80mph along a normal road. Suppose a passenger were to jam on the handbrake. What might actually happen?
@ajmfenn — Someone would likely run into them from behind. What the car itself does would depend on the size and shape of the car, plus the general conditions.
If the driver is skilled though, and there’s no one behind them, you should be able to stop without too much trouble. The tires would skid, but you should be fine.
If your driver isn’t any good, and perhaps it’s wet or something, there’s a chance the car might slide sideways, and possibly flip over.
@ajmfenn — Oh, and the car is more likely to flip over it’s it top heavy (like a van or SUV). And it’s very unlikely to flip over if it has a very low center of gravity (like a Ferrari).
Thanks for your thoughts. Suppose the passenger has to stop the car somehow. Would this be the only option?
Bloody Aussies
ajm.. nope, plenty other options depending on how far one would be willing to go.. suppose the answer is all the way.. one could start by grabbing the steering wheel an in aiming for the closest solid thing in sight… or simply of the road.. than there is the take command of the geasr lever and go for neutral.. a more subtle but perhaps safer approach.. depending on the car.. one would also be able to pull the key out of the ignition.. though at 80mph one might as well go for option 1.. One could aslo ask the driver to stop
.. poke the drivers eye might help persuade.. so the handbrake is just plaine boring.. use your imagination, improvise.. anything can happen on the silver screen you know… in any case good luck.. and let me know should you need a driver 
Where did that plane go!? You can just imagine in real life, how extremely fast that would have all happened. Blink and you’d miss it!
hkaogouOPDOYqhUWUOG IS GOOD
so thats where my car went
citroen c6 is a very safe car. back then a mercedes was probably the safest car
damn. we own a ’79 Rekord and that is just a slightly shorter yet a bit lighter than the Oz Commodore
All crash tests are pretty meaningless anyway.
There are millions of permutations of crash scenarios, and they do what…3 different tests?
The best way to survive a collision is not to have one in the first palce, yet the driving test is still laughable.
Nice STRONG Car!
wow just really kl but scary. how did people survive? honestly that plane crash was the coolest thing i have ever seen crashed.
awesome vids!!
If a car now would crash and have the same damage as that, it would’t be aloud on the road, surely