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SECURITY AWARDS Friday 27th July
Elise and Scooby score poorly in What Car tests
The eighth annual What Car? Security Supertest has revealed that, although new cars are generally more secure than ever, six out of 10 still fail to meet Home Office guidelines on car security.
Of the 67 new models tested by What Car?s independent experts, 42 could be broken into in less than two minutes. Better news was that all 67 put up enough resistance to prevent our team driving it away within the five minutes allowed. The results are published in the September issue of What Car?
'In spite of the improvement there's much work still to be done,' said What Car? editor Steve Fowler. 'Too many cars are still too easy to break into and very few provide somewhere secure to leave valuables.'
Home Office guidelines say a car's locks should keep a determined thief out for two minutes, and the immobiliser should stop it being driven away for a further five. In 1999, 87% of the new cars tested failed to meet these guidelines, but that figure dropped to 70% last year, and improved further to 63% this year.
'Manufacturers can't afford to rest on their laurels. As quickly as they develop new systems, the thieves discover ways around them,' said Steve Fowler. A case in point was the Lexus IS200. It was the top scorer for the last two years, but this time our testers were able to bypass the locks and get inside the car.
Lexus should still feel proud, though, because for the third year running one of its cars sits at the top of the table: this time, the LS430 luxury car maintains its record as the only company ever to score the full 100 points.
Just five points behind were the Saab 9-5 and the Nissan Maxima QX, while there were 90-point scores from Audi's new A4, BMW's 3- and 5-series, the Ford Mondeo, Jaguar S-type and Toyota Previa.
Another Toyota, the Yaris, proved that supermini buyers can expect the same security as cars costing four or five times as much. It also served as a lesson to its rivals at the bottom of the table, the Smart and Suzuki Ignis, which scored just 35 points each.
Sadly, five points above them were two of the UK's most desirable cars, the Lotus Elise and Subaru Impreza WRX.
In addition to What Car?'s own independent tests, the magazine is also publishing for the first time official government-backed New Car Security Ratings, based on research carried out by the Motor Industry Repair Research Centre. The centre assesses the security features of every new car on behalf of the insurance industry. Under NCSR, this research will now be available to car buyers, and will be published in What Car? from the November issue.
Please see the msn gt2 community for the rest. http://communities.msn.com/granturismo2
Elise and Scooby score poorly in What Car tests
The eighth annual What Car? Security Supertest has revealed that, although new cars are generally more secure than ever, six out of 10 still fail to meet Home Office guidelines on car security.
Of the 67 new models tested by What Car?s independent experts, 42 could be broken into in less than two minutes. Better news was that all 67 put up enough resistance to prevent our team driving it away within the five minutes allowed. The results are published in the September issue of What Car?
'In spite of the improvement there's much work still to be done,' said What Car? editor Steve Fowler. 'Too many cars are still too easy to break into and very few provide somewhere secure to leave valuables.'
Home Office guidelines say a car's locks should keep a determined thief out for two minutes, and the immobiliser should stop it being driven away for a further five. In 1999, 87% of the new cars tested failed to meet these guidelines, but that figure dropped to 70% last year, and improved further to 63% this year.
'Manufacturers can't afford to rest on their laurels. As quickly as they develop new systems, the thieves discover ways around them,' said Steve Fowler. A case in point was the Lexus IS200. It was the top scorer for the last two years, but this time our testers were able to bypass the locks and get inside the car.
Lexus should still feel proud, though, because for the third year running one of its cars sits at the top of the table: this time, the LS430 luxury car maintains its record as the only company ever to score the full 100 points.
Just five points behind were the Saab 9-5 and the Nissan Maxima QX, while there were 90-point scores from Audi's new A4, BMW's 3- and 5-series, the Ford Mondeo, Jaguar S-type and Toyota Previa.
Another Toyota, the Yaris, proved that supermini buyers can expect the same security as cars costing four or five times as much. It also served as a lesson to its rivals at the bottom of the table, the Smart and Suzuki Ignis, which scored just 35 points each.
Sadly, five points above them were two of the UK's most desirable cars, the Lotus Elise and Subaru Impreza WRX.
In addition to What Car?'s own independent tests, the magazine is also publishing for the first time official government-backed New Car Security Ratings, based on research carried out by the Motor Industry Repair Research Centre. The centre assesses the security features of every new car on behalf of the insurance industry. Under NCSR, this research will now be available to car buyers, and will be published in What Car? from the November issue.
Please see the msn gt2 community for the rest. http://communities.msn.com/granturismo2
