What's the meaning of a car with no bumpers?

[ysi_maniac]

[PR19_Kit]

The 300SL's predecessor, the W194, had no bumpers either, as it was a pure race car, and the bumpers on production 300SLs were easily removed, as in your pic. in those days they were only held on with bolted-on brackets. And it looks good too. 

Cars these days don't have bumpers really either, their front panels may hide a bumper structure underneath, but there's nothing visible out there.

[scooter]

So there's nothing to impede the pedestrians you hit from gaining awesome air.


Spoiler (highlight): that was sarcasm.  Dark, EMS-fueled, but sarcasm nonetheless

[Wardukw]

The problems with earlyish bumpers ..well right up until they got rid of steel bumpers that is .

Early steel bumpers are heavy ..very heavy and that slows a car down ..they were not good for aerodynamics.
Getting rid of the front and rear bumpers from the old days could save alot of weight and any weight savings you could get would equal more speed .
Over time and with a better understanding of aerodynamics with saloon cars bumpers started to conform to the body and made of thinner steel and then plastic .

[kerick]

In the US there is a structure behind the plastic to be able to withstand a 5 mpg crash with no damage. Above that, there will be plenty of unseen damage.
Some cars do look a lot better without bumpers. Cars in the 50's had the bumper exaggerated to become a large part of the styling of the car. Then there was the Edsel.   

[PR19_Kit]

In the US there is a structure behind the plastic to be able to withstand a 5 mpg crash with no damage.

And pretty much everywhere else as well. The days when cars sold in the US had to be made differently to everywhere else are long gone, thank goodness.

That's even though GETTING some of them through the US Regs kept me in bread and milk for a few of my working years.............

[Old Wombat]

In the US there is a structure behind the plastic to be able to withstand a 5 mpg crash with no damage.

I'm just curious about how fast you need to be driving to have a crash whilst sucking down that much fuel?




(Sorry, I pick up on things like this & Kit's "panel limes" & my mind asks ridiculous questions that need to be asked or my mind keeps coming back to it for days! )

[kerick]

I blame it all on auto correct!   
And old eyeballs......
It really can come out pretty funny sometimes. I usually proof read what I write but missed that one. Now I'll have to correct it and no one will know what we're talking about.

[scooter]

In the US there is a structure behind the plastic to be able to withstand a 5 mpg crash with no damage.

I'm just curious about how fast you need to be driving to have a crash whilst sucking down that much fuel?

You know how we yanks like our inefficient monster pickup trucks and massive suburban assault vehicles.
 



Says the guy that drives a 2018 Subaru

[PR19_Kit]

We had a 1966 (I think) Plymouth Sport Fury IV at Pressed Steel in our 'FVE Section'. That's 'Foreign Vehicles Evaluation', where 'Foreign' meant 'Not built by Pressed Steel', so it gave us BAGS of scope to get all sorts of oddities during my time on that section. 

It had a 426 Hemi engine, rated at 425 bhp, but they were VERY big horses, and it's reported 0-60 mph time was 4.2 secs! Back then!!!!! 

During the 6 months we had it (we had to return it to its original country to avoid paying Customs Duty etc) it AVERAGED 8 mpg!!!!!

We may have been testing its performance a  bit..........................