Five Midsize SUVs Earn Top Safety Picks
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety tested 12 new midsize SUVs with its new rollover crush strength requirement, and only six passed.
Of the six, five earned the Top Safety Pick award, which means they received the top score of Good in front, side, rear and roof crash tests and are equipped with stability control.
Although the Jeep Liberty and its Dodge Nitro twin had the best results for roof strength at five times the weight of the vehicle, they rated Acceptable and Marginal in rear and side crash tests, respectively.
The five new Top Safety Picks are:- 2011 Jeep Grand Cherokee
- 2011 Kia Sorento
- 2010 Chevrolet Equinox
- 2010 Toyota Highlander
- 2010 Toyota Venza
IIHS’ roof-strength tests are more stringent; even the Accord sedan scored an Acceptable rating at 3.87 times its weight. (To earn a Good rating, the roof must withstand a force of four times the vehicle’s weight.) The Crosstour’s 600 pounds of added weight likely doesn’t help its cause here.
The 2010 Ford Edge — a redesigned 2011 model is planned for a summer release — scored Acceptable for roof strength, while the 2010 Mazda CX-7, Nissan Murano, Honda Pilot and Mitsubishi Endeavor all scored a Marginal rating like the Crosstour.
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That brings Toyota brand with the most top safety picks... holla Toyota has 7 picks with the next closest is Subaru with 5.
http://www.iihs.org/ratings/default.aspx
Poor Crosstour...getting no love.
The standards are being met regularly now so it's time to raise the standards even higher.
dee,
but that's apples and oranges. You're counting 3 toyota brands and over 20 nameplates to subaru's 5 for 5?
However it does best all the other full-line automakers which says a lot.
On the Honda front, it's interesting that Kia now has more Top Safety Picks than Honda.
Toyota also has the most models of any single brand...it should have the most top safety picks. what you really have to look at is the proportion of top safety picks to the actual amount of models in its lineup, and you'll see that it isnt very good. you shouldnt even have to consider that when it has only two more than Subaru, a brand with one of the smallest lineups in the mainstream market.
It's really interesting that on the Institute's own site, the headline doesn't call out all the new Top Safety Pick winners, but rather it calls out the Accord Crosstour for getting a Marginal along with four other vehicles. Guess that's a change in strategy to call out the dogs since, as Dave mentioned, some companies that in the past did well don't do so well now and some past laggards have stepped up their game.
Kia has really stepped up their game. Good to see.
Now Ford needs to get in.