Every report seems to focus on the safety of the smart...

[mvukovich]

I feel the car is safe and small enough to avoid some accidents. My worry is this will give the insurance companies a excuse to rasie their rates.

[gingerm]

I feel the Smart Car would be one of the safer small cars I have owned.
VW, Honda Civic, Geo Metro

[jonnysan]

My car is and has always been tight as a drum! I am a very defensive driver and have 40+ years of training being so having had small cars most of my life. I am not the least bit worried about how I would fare in an accident in my smart....less worried than when I am in my S-2000 and I've averted many a bender in the last 8 years. Training is everything. When driving many places in Upstate NY, one gets accident aversion training by default just missing the deer crossing the roads! Running into one of them worries me as much as being hit by another car as they can enter the cab via the front windshield, still alive, and do all kinds of damage with their very strong, flailing hooves....and horns.....

And as for shaking mirrors on cars...PHEW! Can't tell you all the cars I've had with those...not the smartie, though.

[okeven]

I hit a deer at 65 MPH in a Geo Metro. If you can survive that, you can survive anything.

[kwagar]

Things sure seem to have a way of getting blown out of proportion around here. As far as I can find there is a single report of a shaking rear view mirror, hardly an indication of a systemic problem. In addition, the crash test results for the smart were better than the vast majority of cars tested.

Sure one ought to exercize defensive driving skills. But for God's sake people the results that were posted wre good! What would you be saying if the results had been poor?

So much ado about nothing!!!!!

[ex300SRT8]

Afraid no, but with so many huge vehicles out there with massive power, driving at speeds that possibly exceed the vehicles agility, I'd say a concern for the physics of an impact with them is healthy and realistic. What interests me is going to be how the public responds to the hype of when our vehicles do inevitably become involved in accidents, injuries and regrettably fatalities. I hope the back-lash is not as severe as the pessimist in me anticipates.That would be unfortunate.

[RussBarnes]

First for the record my outside mirrors don't shake either. A little buzzing as I go up through the gears but for heavens sake this is a 1 liter, three cylinder, high reving motor and the vibration harmonics are fierce. I think they did a great job. Get a life people, have you always driven your father's Olds?

As to safety. I daily drive a 6000#+ diesel Excursion to work, I own and am rebuilding a 19,450# Kenworth T2000 to carry a smart and tow a 22,000# fifth wheeler and that is a light weight compared to a loaded 18 wheeler. I think if I were to be hit by a loaded semi at speed I would rather be in my smart than that in my Excursion because in the smart I would get away from all the whiners here rather than being a vegetable for life because the Excursion folded around me and face reading all these sob stories on boards like this from people that need to experience some living.

OK off my soapbox. Does it worry me, sure I am more careful, but not because of some silly stars. It is a little car and there are big things out there. I have owned six cycles and drove defensive on those and that was before soccer mom's on cell phones.

I was in one head-on in a '58 Chev Impala and one roll-over in a CJ-5 Jeep. I was a rider in a '57 Ford as it hit a deer, accidents are no fun, so no matter what, drive safe.

[centerxtreme]

Worry is interest paid on something you'll probably never own. I'm enjoying my smart and didn't buy it because of what others thought. It has a sound reputation from a solid company and a decade of history- smile be happy!

[Springlering]

I have the cabrio, no mirror shake here. No harmonics on the paddle shift, either. It's smooth as butter, and I am happy as a bug with those paddles.

I did take a moment to watch about a dozen YouTube crash test videos today, just to reassure myself, since we anticipate putting both kids in Smarts.

My dad and the janitor were watching over my shoulder, and were shocked at how the Smart "gobbled up" (their words) the Fiat, and amazed at how the safety cage was intact after that 70mph crash.

You'd have to be foolishly driving way beyond the car's capabilities to roll a Smart, imho, unless you got clobbered from the side like the Mercedes t-bone test. It could happen, but there is a serious accident a week on the corner in front of my insurance office (yeah, go figure, I know), and I've seen little cars demolish big ones and vice versa. Our corner is littered with car bits.

If it's gonna happen, it's gonna happen regardless of what you drive, and I'm comfortable with our choice.

I don't feel like I bought a Corvair by any stretch of the imagination.

[jwight]

"I don't feel like I bought a Corvair by any stretch of the imagination."

Please, let's not perpetuate that myth any longer; I've owned a total of 3 of those cars and they were as safe (or no more unsafe) as similar cars of that period. They were maligned by the unknowing, just as the smart seems to be today. Off soapbox now.