Quote:
Originally Posted by Oulixes
The active hood concept is interesting - this is the first time I've read about it in crash testing results. I wonder if it's implemented on the cars sold in NA.
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If I'm not mistaken, this feature is driven purely by design and aesthetic considerations.
It's there so that the car will be able to comply with the european pedestrian safety standards which require a certain distance between hard parts like the engine and the hood. This allows a crumple zone that is less damaging to the human head as it smashes against the thin/deformable sheetmetal of the hood so that it doesn't have a secondary collision between the head/engine block.
Rather than dealing with the hideous frontal design consequence of building in this crumple zone/distance between hood/engine, they lay the hood just over the engine and then create an active device to enlarge that distance in the case of an accident.
I'm glad they did from a looks perspective. I'm speaking here off the cuff, but I think this is largely correct.