Lee: I have a narrow opinion about this because most of the applications I deal with are trucks or Jeeps. Many of them are used for sport truck-type purposes. It's hard for me to imagine that group of people jumping up and down wanting to do fuel cells. They didn't even like us when we went from carburetors to fuel injection. "Stop that. We use our truck. We know how they work, and we know how to fix them when we're 50 miles from home. Don't mess with them."
How will the bumper height difference between cars and trucks pan out?Julow: We've looked at this, but there are some laws of physics which just cannot be violated. I think there's a large part of the initiative on the car side that will address this. At the end of the day it's people in Neons, not Durangos, that are most worried about it. At some point you have to impress upon them the safety and accident-avoidance features of the vehicles they are driving. I don't see a groundswell that would legislate certain types of vehicles out because they don't happen to look like other vehicles people drive. Can there be compromises? Bumpers no higher than this? No lower than that? I suspect so. Remember when 5 mph bumpers came and went? That was going to ruin the American car business. At the end of the day, we've got pretty nice bumpers on our cars. Can we do that to match Durango and Neon bumpers exactly? Probably not. Can we make them pretty close? Probably.
I'd love for someone to take up the challenge of trying to explain to the American customer how much safer they are in today's automobile than they were 20 or 40 years ago. You look at the air bags, the three-point restraints, the energy-absorbing interior of cars, and the crush-space that we've put in with the barrier crash initiatives. Any time you talk about fatal accidents in a newer vehicle, there's a huge amount of energy involved-70-mph rearend collision into a stopped vehicle.
I think from a standpoint of safety, you're going to see more equipment. Not just passive types of safety devices, but also avoidance devices such as sonar and speed-warnings. The technology is coming. But the distance we've traveled in the 25 years I've been in the business is incredible.
Goldenthal: There is a lot of activity on the governmental front for added safety. There are new things coming and more competitive activity on safety. Some of the competitors with good crash ratings have raised the bar and raised people's consciousness on that. We have our safety programs, including emphasis on putting children in the backseats, which is the safest place in the vehicle. We stress the importance of seatbelt use...it's about the most important thing you can do next to driving sober.
I think that there is going to be more regulation, people are going to be more conscious of it, and there's going to be competitive pressure to excel in safety. Whether it's going to be standard or optional, whether the customer's going to be forced to pay for it, and what compromises it might make to the vehicle, remains to be seen.
Who's WhoJim JulowVice-President, Dodge Car & Truck DivisionRick AnierosVice-President, Jeep, Truck Color & Trim DesignRobert LeeDirector, Rear-Wheel-Drive V-Engine EngineeringRobert GoldenthalSenior Manager, Vehicle Safety & Regulatory Affairs