It takes massive computing power, expensive dummies and about 600 full-scale crash tests a year to ensure Ford and Lincoln vehicles meet safety standards for every market in the world.
Here are some of the details:
• It took 40 years to conduct the first 20,000 tests and half that time for the next 10,000.
• The Dearborn crash test site does five full vehicle crashes of every description a day.
• Engineers spend weeks running thousands of computer simulations before a car is launched at 30 miles per hour into a wall
• The crash vehicle is painted to highlight critical elements
• Sensors, accelerometers and high-speed cameras are installed to capture as many as 30 different views of the crash and measure the forces of the impact.
• The crash test itself is over in a matter of seconds and within half an hour the data is downloaded onto servers so the analysis can begin
• It can take a week or two to gather all the structural data from the crashed car and weeks to complete the analysis before any decisions are made.
• Ford has increased its computing power 50% in the last decade and is doubling its power every two years
• Ford has processed more than 2 million crash test simulations in the past .
