I've always felt safe in my E30. It may not have received the highest crash test rating, but stories people post here about their accidents and my personal experiences have always led me to believe that these are pretty safe cars. I've seen many cases both online and in person where an e30 or e36 owner is involved in a bad accident and walks away with no or minor injuries. The only e30 related death I know of is when someone in the ATL crashed his e30 with 4 people inside. Three of the four people survived but I believe one person in the rear did not make it.
Safety was never really a huge concern for me. However times change and people mature. I'm really happy with my life at the moment and I'd like to stick around for awhile.
When I hop from my e39 into my e30 I get nervous. The e30 has no traction control, no airbags (my e39 has 6), is small, and is almost 20 years old which means old safety technology. If I crash my e39 at my typical 85-90mph freeway speed, I'm confident I will walk away. If I crash my e30 at my typical 85-90mph freeway speed...I'm not so sure.
I have 4 point harness in my e30 coupe, but I never wear them anymore after hearing about how a 4pt harness will actually hurt you in a rollover unless you have a roll bar or a 4 door sedan with a solid B pillar.
I always buckle up. Do to my Vader conversion (The Vaders are mounted to 3/8" steel brackets with hardware. The brackets mount to the OEM seat points with stock hardware), the seatbelts setup is as follows:
Stock e30 seatbelts plug into Vader buckles. Since I had to remove the seat belt bar from my coupe, I put in the smaller 4 door e30 seat belt bracket. The bracket mounts to the OEM location and the seatbelt is attached to this bracket with a thick metal link. The link screws apart on one side which is how I got it to loop through the seatbelt and seatbelt bracket. At first, I was worried about the link, but it feels and looks more solid then the stock e30 4 door seat belt bracket that I am using. I figure if the 4 door bracket is rated high enough to hold up in a crash, the link should be more then enough. See the picture below:
So,
1. How safe is the e30 really?
2. Care to share your personal experiences?
3. How safe is my e30 with my custom seats and seat belt setup? Can I do anything to improve my setup?
Safety was never really a huge concern for me. However times change and people mature. I'm really happy with my life at the moment and I'd like to stick around for awhile.
When I hop from my e39 into my e30 I get nervous. The e30 has no traction control, no airbags (my e39 has 6), is small, and is almost 20 years old which means old safety technology. If I crash my e39 at my typical 85-90mph freeway speed, I'm confident I will walk away. If I crash my e30 at my typical 85-90mph freeway speed...I'm not so sure.
I have 4 point harness in my e30 coupe, but I never wear them anymore after hearing about how a 4pt harness will actually hurt you in a rollover unless you have a roll bar or a 4 door sedan with a solid B pillar.
I always buckle up. Do to my Vader conversion (The Vaders are mounted to 3/8" steel brackets with hardware. The brackets mount to the OEM seat points with stock hardware), the seatbelts setup is as follows:
Stock e30 seatbelts plug into Vader buckles. Since I had to remove the seat belt bar from my coupe, I put in the smaller 4 door e30 seat belt bracket. The bracket mounts to the OEM location and the seatbelt is attached to this bracket with a thick metal link. The link screws apart on one side which is how I got it to loop through the seatbelt and seatbelt bracket. At first, I was worried about the link, but it feels and looks more solid then the stock e30 4 door seat belt bracket that I am using. I figure if the 4 door bracket is rated high enough to hold up in a crash, the link should be more then enough. See the picture below:
So,
1. How safe is the e30 really?
2. Care to share your personal experiences?
3. How safe is my e30 with my custom seats and seat belt setup? Can I do anything to improve my setup?
Comment