A 7,000-Pound Car Smashed Through a Guardrail. That’s Bad News for All of Us.

dantheclamman@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 323 points –
A 7,000-Pound Car Smashed Through a Guardrail. That’s Bad News for All of Us.
slate.com
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Hmm, these huge trucks are killing pedestrians, causing worse crashes due to crash incompatibility, destroying the climate, and now smashing through guard rails and flying off cliffs. We'd better change our entire country's infrastructure to accommodate them.

Isn't this just the road trying to solve the problem for us? I say we should have more ditches and guardrail barriers!

Lol you apparently didn't read the article... it's calling out EVs because they're usually heavier than the ICE counterparts. Small sedans are pushing 5k pounds now being EVs. Batteries are very very heavy.

It’s worth highlighting that this study isn’t really about the merits of EVs. After all, you can buy an EV that weighs less than 5,000 pounds. You just can’t electrify your favorite already-large car—or even buy a hulking gas-powered car—and expect guardrails to work as intended. “Weight is a universal problem; it is not unique to electric vehicles,” Stolle said. “We have similar concerns about the compatibility of the biggest gas-powered cars with our guardrail system.” The 6,700-pound Chevrolet Silverado 1500 already weighs too much, based on the result from this research, and the 8,500-pound Silverado EV weighs even more.

Yes but you called out trucks like they're the only issue. An electric leaf is almost 5k pounds....a leaf...

A leaf is 3500-3900 lbs, not almost 5k lbs

Well if you squint at that round to the nearest 5k ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ ͡⁠°⁠ ͜⁠ʖ⁠ ͡⁠°⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

Curb weight on them is 4,900, yes it's not 5k that's why I said nearly 5k....and the point I am making is that a tiny car like that weighing that much shows that batteries are not light.

You added an extra 1000 lbs to the heaviest version, then rounded up. The whole entire point of standard weights is so numbskulls don't just make up numbers for how much things weigh, like you are. The leaf is 350-3900 lbs, not 4900 lbs, not 5000 lbs. Please go back to elementary school.

https://www.autoblog.com/buy/2022-Nissan-LEAF-S__4dr_Hatchback/specs/

Should have clarified that I meant gross weight.

Curb weight is the weight of the car itself, plus any gas, oil, etc it needs to function.

Gross weight is maximum weight the vehicle is designed to support. It's the curb weight plus the payload capacity.

If a car has a curb weight of 3k lbs and a gross weight of 4k, it doesn't weigh 4k lbs unless you have 1k lbs of passengers and cargo in it.

It doesn't help that the first EVs most manufacturers are focusing on are their large SUVs and trucks. The Chevy Bolt and Tesla Model 3 both certainly aren't small cars in a general sense, but in the land of EVs they are. Both weigh under 4000 pounds which is less than the best selling vehicle in North America, the F150.

Totally agree, but to act like it's only trucks pushing this weight is silly. The electric leaf is nearly 5k lbs and it's a very small EV.

The 2024 leaf is 3509lbs according to the Nissan USA website.

3500-3900 depends on what you get for options. Add in people and their shit and you're pushing 5k (curb weight is 4,900bs)

You keep misusing the term curb weight.

From teh googs: Curb weight is the weight of the vehicle including a full tank of fuel and all standard equipment. It does not include the weight of any passengers, cargo, or optional equipment.

There's a big difference between pushing the limit and significantly exceeding the limit though.

One gets you across the bridge. One gets you a nice dip in the river.