About 100 automobiles have received a safety award from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) for this year, but you’ll be terrified to discover a small pickup on the list. In a recent round of testing, the company examined eight small trucks and discovered a few key shortcomings.
IIHS rated the crew cab and extended cab variations of 4 different models: the Toyota Tacoma, Chevrolet Colorado, GMC Canyon, and the Nissan Frontier. These trucks all provided nothing but Poor-rated headlights, avoiding them from making a Top Safety Pick or Top Safety Pick+ award.
Half of the pickups performed good in all five crash categories, consisting of the tough small overlap test. The Tacoma crew cab and extended cab, Chevrolet Colorado crew cab, and GMC Canyon crew cab, all of them made overall “Good” ratings in the small overlap, which reproduces what takes place when the front corner of a vehicle hits a tree, pole, or another vehicle at 40 mph. The Tacoma crew cab earned the best one with “Excellent” sub-ratings for structure, restraints and kinematics, and all injury measures apart from the lower leg and foot category, where it received an “Acceptable” rating. This model was the only one to get a “Good” rating in the structure subcategory by maintaining survival space for the dummy in a crash.
Extended cab Colorados and Canyons carried out somewhat even worse than their crew cab counterparts, earning an “Acceptable” score in the small overlap assessment. Both the Nissan Frontier crew cab and extended cab were deemed “Marginal,” as the structure enabled substantial invasion into the occupant compartment at the time of a crash. IIHS concluded motorists were likely to suffer severe injuries in a real-world crash during the same conditions.
Another category IIHS takes into account when administering awards is front crash prevention technology. Just the Colorado and Canyon use this technology, however both are rated “Basic” and are restricted to front crash warning without any automatic emergency braking (AEB) ability. For 2018, the Tacoma is set to get a basic AEB system with pedestrian detection along with upgraded headlights.
The 2017 Honda Ridgeline, classified as a large pickup by IIHS, made a Top Safety Pick+ award. It snatched “Good” score in all crash categories as well as a “Good” headlight rating and “Superior” front crash prevention rating.
