When it comes to road safety, new cars seem to be miles ahead of old cars.
Old cars don’t have as many safety features, so you could say they’re at a severe disadvantage. Even if you consider yourself a safe driver, you can’t control what everyone else does on the roads so, given the choice, most people would prefer a new car over an old car.
What Makes New Cars Safe?
Modern vehicles are chock full of safety features to provide greater levels of injury protection to drivers and passengers in car crashes. Technologies like lane-keep assist and blind-spot monitoring help prevent an accident, and when an accident happens, other engineering features of the vehicle help protect the occupants. New vehicles are also tested all the time by agencies like ANCAP helping buyers identify which have modern crash protection features.
These include:
- Crumple zones – crumple zones absorb crash energy, so the car absorbs the impact of the crash, not the driver or passengers.
- Stronger occupant compartment – the cabin of the car keeps its shape in head-on crashes to protect the driver and passenger and dashboard, pedals, steering wheel are not pushed forward.
- Side impact protection – better side door strength, internal padding, and improved seats can provide more protection in side-impact crashes.
- Side airbags – to protect the head in side-impact and rollover crashes.
- Seatbelt improvements – webbing clamps to stop reeling out, seatbelt warning systems.
Why spend your money on a new car rather than risking it with your old one?
Aside from the fact that an older car will not include the safety features outlined above, an older car will also be less reliable and have a shorter lifespan.
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Increased mileage
your old car may have been with you through thick and thin, but it has also hiked up the km’s on your speedometer. This increases the wear and tear on your vehicle. In particular, balding tires that have not been seen to are a dangerous risk on the roads.
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High maintenance
having to continually replace car parts can get hexxy. Older vehicles require frequent attention and services to make sure everything is working accordingly. If you miss a service it could be the difference between your brake pads working in an accident and you collide with another car.
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Petrol
many older cars can be gas-guzzling demons that really take it out of your weekly paycheck. Older cars aren’t made with the same efficiency in performance that new cars are designed with. You may be able to tell how long you can drive with your ‘empty’ light on until the last km but this familiarity can also be drivers’ downfall – older cars can be temperamental and you don’t want to run out of petrol in peak hour traffic on a bridge!
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Warranty
it’s likely that your old car’s warranty has well and truly expired. Many new cars will come with a warranty covering repairs and sometimes services. Time to add up how much you are spending on repairing your old car per month, and judge whether this is more than what you would pay on a monthly new car loan!
Overall, the people most at risk of having a car crash are the young and inexperienced. It is important to have a car that will protect you on the road when you cannot control other drivers’ actions. Having second thoughts about repairing your old car? Save money on repairs and call MetalBiz to sell your old car for scrap metal and invest the cash in a new, safer vehicle that you can rely on!
Last updated on October 18th, 2021 at 07:26 am