With the emphasis truly on safe crash repair, driven by the complexity of the modern vehicle and the stringent demands of the Thatcham/BSI Kitemark, repair experts Thatcham have now completed a project aimed at proving the integrity of their own structural repair methods for three mainstream vehicles.

By Thatcham © The Motor Insurance Repair Research Centre 2008
October, 2008

 The History Between Thatcham and Euro NCAP:

Thatcham’s contribution to improving vehicle safety is globally renowned. Now the insurer funded centre’s work has received official European recognition from the vehicle safety organisation Euro NCAP, that Thatcham have been selected as the first official testing house for their forthcoming rear impact (whiplash) ratings programme.

In a continued drive to provide as much additional safety information to consumers as possible, Euro NCAP (the European New Car Assessment Programme), will for the first time include a rear impact (whiplash) test and assessment as part of the organisation’s crash test ratings from November 2008. This new test will be an integral part of Euro NCAP’s new rating scheme and will be included as part of Euro NCAP’s Adult Occupant Rating when the new scheme is launched in February 2009. Having researched and tested seats and head restraints for over four years, Thatcham’s robust test procedures and experience in producing related ratings were key factors in their selection. As were the quality of testing facilities at the Berkshire base, which include the Hyper G Sled, a £1 million British insurer investment specifically to research and test seats and head restraints.

Today: With the emphasis truly on safe crash repair, driven by the complexity of the modern vehicle and the stringent demands of the Thatcham/BSI Kitemark, repair experts Thatcham have now completed a project aimed at proving the integrity of their own structural repair methods for three mainstream vehicles.

The primary aim of Thatcham’s Safe Repair Project is to validate repairs on vehicles where there are known substantial differences in panel joining methods from the processes used in manufacture. Particularly significant are the repair methods for key structural areas like front chassis legs or complete B-post reinforcements, where safety is paramount and the correct repair method intrinsically important.

The three vehicles chosen for the recent project were the Vauxhall Astra H, the Vauxhall Vectra C and the Volkswagen Golf V. The Vauxhall Astra H had the front chassis leg replaced, whilst the Vectra and Golf each had the B Post replaced. All three vehicles were repaired according to escribe, Thatcham’s repair methods product, in each case requiring similar structural repairs, but very different and specific repair techniques.*

Having undergone repair each of the three vehicles were then impacted in accordance with the appropriate Euro NCAP (European New Car Assessment Programme) test using the standard side and frontal impact protocols to collect and assess the impact data.

All three vehicles performed extremely well with the repair proving robust enough to withstand a severe impact and the resultant impact data from the Anthropomorthic Test Dummy, used in the tests, coming well within acceptable test variation limits.

Andrew Miller, Director of Research at Thatcham said, “This project is another example of where Thatcham is leading the field in research relevant to repair. Our researched repair methods are now proven to restore the safety capability of the modern high Euro NCAP scoring vehicles, thus providing reassurance to the consumer, repairer and insurer.”

After this successful project, Thatcham will now continue to validate specific structural repair methods, reporting the results back to vehicle manufacturers and working closely with repairers, insurers and manufacturers to provide the Kitemarked repairer with a safe repair.

*For more information about this particular repair validation project, please see the coming issue of Thatcham’s Research News which will be distributed via email and our website later on this week.