**The Safety Features of Race Cars**

In a race car, safety is crucial when the temperature climbs to 170 degrees by the pedals. Good Lord! Race drivers are known to lose up to 10 pounds of body weight from sweat during a race. In addition to a helmet, modern drivers wear a HANS device or head and neck support.

**The Importance of Safety Features in Passenger Cars**

Safety features in passenger cars are designed to slow down the rate of deceleration. The crumple zone is the first area of impact, taking a lot of the force of the crash and slowing the car down, dispersing the force over the whole car. As your body goes forwards, the seat belt restrains you while also giving a little bit of slack to slow your body down even more. As your body continues to move forward, the airbag expands to meet your chest and face and absorb that impact.

**Why Race Cars Don't Have Airbags**

Race cars have different safety needs than passenger cars meant for the road. Comfort isn't a big concern in a race car because it's all about going fast. But comfort is a huge concern in road cars, which need room to move around, stretch, observe surroundings, and grab coffee or adjust mirrors. All that requires space to move around.

**The Difference Between Race Cars and Passenger Cars**

Race cars have most of these features but heavy-duty versions of them to deal with the extra force of going 200 miles an hour. The biggest difference between the two is the amount of space between the driver's seat and the steering wheel. In a race car, the cockpit is engineered to be as compact as possible.

**The Role of HANS Devices in Safety**

A racing harness is designed to restrain a driver much more than a normal seat belt plus the HANS device, which restrains the head from whipping forward in a crash. When unrestrained, drivers can suffer a Basilar skull fracture, tragically what happened to NASCAR legend Dale Earnhardt in 2001.

**Why Airbags Might Not Be Suitable for Race Cars**

An airbag would probably make driving an F1 car more dangerous. Rally drivers often hit curbs and get in small accidents but keep driving as if their car is totally fine. Minor impacts could set off the airbag, obstructing the driver's view when they might need to get out of the way.

**The Issue of Engine Fires**

If a driver crashed and the airbag went off, it would also make it harder to undo the harness and get out of the car in the event of an engine fire. That's probably the worst way you can go - trapped in a burning car.

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WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: en(upbeat music)- Racing is the mostdangerous sport in the world.The probability of gettinginto a crash is super highand every single crash hasthe potential to be fatal.Yes, the microphone is here now.But race car safety has come a long waysince racing's early days.Just in recent memory,F1 driver Kimi Raikkonenwalked away from a crashin which he experienced 47 Gs.Whew.That's insane.You know how many Gswe have here on Earth?One G.But even with the last100 years of innovation,drivers are still in loads of danger.So, why don't race cars have air bags?In this video, we're gonna take a lookat how safety features inrace cars were innovated,from the roll cage to the helmet,to even something as smallas the rear view mirror.We're gonna take a look at whythose features are necessaryin World Rally Championshipracing, Formula 1, and NASCAR.And how those features have trickled downto the cars we drive today.When auto racing first started,safety was basically non-existent.Cars were unreliable,open cockpit missiles,running around on primitive technologyand skinny tires.Most of the effort of the effortwent into making cars fasterand virtually no effort wasput into making them safer.Racing was considered acalculated risk for the driversand death was an unspoken,very real possibility.Every race could be their last.The most dangerous sport hasactually made every day lifea lot safer for everyone around the world.In fact, we can thankinnovations in racingfor almost all the safety featureswe have in our cars today.All it took was a bunchof horrific crashesfor us to learn.Rear view mirrors arecrucial for defensive drivingand staying aware of your surroundings.The first known instanceof a race car driverusing a rear view mirror was Ray Harrounand his Marmon race carat the very firstIndianapolis 500 in 1911.The mirror turned out to beuseless during the race though,because the rough surfaceshook the mirror so hardthat Harroun couldn't focus on anything.Whoops.Rear view mirrors havechanged very little since thenother than their placement.Mostly they've remainedright outside the cockpit.It doesn't benefit any car tonot see what's behind them.One device that has adirectly measurable impacton driver safety is theroll bar slash roll cage.In the event of a car rolling over,these devices literally shield the driverfrom their surroundings.Some of the firstmandated uses of roll barswere in Formula 3 racing,dating as far back as 1948.Roll bars became mandatoryin the USAC Racing Circuit in 1959and shortly after in Formula 1,following the move tomid engine placement.But for the better part of the '60s,roll bars were basically useless in F1.They were very low and didn'tprotect the driver very muchin a roll over.Modern F1 cars are builtto exact the specificationsand utilize the air intakeas the roll over pointthat protects the driver's head.Doesn't seem like it'd be very strongbut it's probably the strongestpoint on the entire car.For cars that didn't have open cockpits,there was the roll cage.The FIA mandated that allcars must use a roll cageor roll bar in 1971.And since then,they've been getting strongerand lighter ever since.One type of racing thathas immensely benefitedfrom the use of rollcages is rally racing.They not only protect the driverin the event of a crash or a roll over,but they actually improve the handlingand performance of a carbecause of the added stiffness.WRC driver Ott Tanak and his co-driversurvived a horrific crashat the Rally Monte Carloearlier this year, thanksto their roll cage.His Hyundai Velostor N flew off the roadgoing 110 miles an hour.But both driver and co-driverwalked away from thecrash totally unharmed.Roll cages set the stage for innovationsin unibody constructionfound in production carsfor the regular consumer.Stiffer cabin componentsnot only protect driversin the event of rollovers,but they provide stiffnessand reduce body flexingwhich can a drain on performance.Before disc brakes werestandard on most cars,drum brakes were theprimary means of stopping.In the racing world, thefirst car to use disc brakeswas the BRM type-15 in thelate 1951 Formula 1 season.A Jaguar c-type, equippedwith disc brakes,won Le Mans back in 1953,which is the same yearthat for the first timea production car debuted with disc brakes(stutters)disc brakes on all four wheels.There are many advantages discbrakes have over drum brakes.But first, let's lookat how they both work.A drum brake uses a drum onthe interior of the wheel hub.When the brake pedal is pressed,a set of shoes presses outwardsagainst the surface of that drum,creating fiction and slowing the car down.A disc brake has a flat rotorconnected to the wheel hub.When the brake pedal is pressed,a caliber pinches the rotorlike a mechanical crab claw,slowing the car down.Disc brakes are way moreefficient at dispersing heatand less likely to experience brake fade,which is the loss ofefficiency brakes experiencewhen something becomes super heated.Something as small asdriving over a puddlein a car with drum brakes canlessen their effectiveness,as water can splash inside the drumand make the shoes slip.That sucks.Nowadays though, Formula 1cars use carbon composite discsand six piston calibers.The Brabham F1 teamwas the first to usecomposite discs in 1976.The composite showed an advantageover other disc materials,like steel or iron,because the carbon'sexceptional, thermal, frictionaland anti-warp in capabilities.Just in the last 10years of F1 competition,brakes have gotten significantly better.Brake technology from race carshas made the made the technologyin production cars much safer.Modern sports carsexclusively use disc brakesand some use carbon ceramic brakesthat cost thousands of dollars to replaceand make a lot of noisecompared to steel rotorswhich cause some Porsche ownersto complain a few years ago,that their cars were too loud.Look, you ordered the fancy brakes.Now live with them.Give me your carbon ceramicsif you don't want 'em.Good Lord.Brakes don't mean much without good tiresand race tire technologyhas come a long wayin a relatively short amount of time.There's a tire for everysort of weather condition,driving style a coarse.One reason cars are safer nowis because tires havebecome more predictable.Rubber compounds havebeen tested and refinedfor decades now.And the result is a tirethat resists ware better,diverts water better,and most importantly,grips the track better.Tire companies are constantly strivingto create the best tirefor each application,tweaking compounds and tread patternsto optimize every aspect.The stiffness, the heatthreshold, the resistance,the resilience.Pirelli supplies all thetires used in Formula 1and every single tire isaccounted for with a barcodelike they're in freakin'Hitman or something.Technically speaking, F1teams don't own the tires,they just lease them from Pirelli.Pirelli have to do thisbecause the compounds they experiment withcould be taken by anothercompany and profited from.There's a legitimate concernthat a rival will geta piece of their tireand reverse engineer the compoundby just picking up littlemarble at the race track.That's what they callthe little rubber bits.So it's in Pirelli's best interestto make sure all thesetires make their wayback to the lab.Even the ones that disintegrateneed to be picked up piece by pieceand returned to Pirelli.That's nuts.Of the earliest safetydevices to appear in race carsis one that we take for granted today.Seat belts.Modern multi point harnesses foundin the highest level of racing nowadaysstarted as simple two point lap belt.The widespread use seatbelts and harnesses in racingdidn't happen until the 1950s.But even then, they weren't standardized.It was commonly acceptedthat a crash would be saferif the driver was ejected from the carwhich might otherwise trap them in flames.(deep husky voice) Trapped in flames.That sucks.(breathing heavily)(deep husky voice) Trapped in flames.That's not even the mostbrutal I can go, dude.It wasn't until physicians in the 1930sstarted testing safety beltsthat they saw undeniable proofthat the restraint of a seat beltwas much safer thanbeing flung out of a car.Go figure.But it still took a long time after thatto convince some drivers and racing teamsthat it was, in fact, safer.Although loosely enforced,NASCAR started requiringsafety belts since the 1940s.Things got better in 1958 whena Swedish engineer at Volvoby the name of Nils Bohlininvented the three point safety belt.The addition of the second strapacross the driver's torsorestrained the top half of the bodyfrom whipping forwardinto the steering wheel.Nils could have licensedhis three point seat beltout to manufacturersand made a ton of money.But he chose to leave thepatent open for other companiesto use freely.That's truly selfless.The world thanks you, Nils.While some race teams havehistorically been opposedto increasing safety measures,mainly because of the added cost,some drivers have fought tohave better safety standards.We've all seen the old footageof Le Mans drivers running to their carsstarting a peeling out, right?Well, that tradition changed after 1969.That year, Jacky Ickxhad suffered the lossof his teammate.And as a result, protestedthe traditional startover safety concerns.Instead of running over to his carlike the rest of his drivers,Jacky walked over to his GG40and took extra time toput on his safety belt.He may have lost his starting positionbut he wanted to provethat it was better to be safe than sorry.His point was furtheremphasized a short time laterwhen British driver, John Wolfe,slid out into the grassand crashed his Porsche 917on the first lap of the race.Because Wolfe's Porschedidn't have a seatbelt,he was ejected from his car and killed.Jacky Ickx won Le Mans that year,proving his point that safetyis worth the extra effort.And the next year the rules were changedto make the start of the race safer.(slow upbeat music)Damn.Another Jackie,the legendary race driver,Sir Jackie Stewart,pushed for improved safetya few years earlier in Formula 1.Which led to the mandateduse of the six point harness.Nowadays, racing harnessing in Formula 1have to keep the driversnug in their cockpitwhile dealing with moreforce than ever before.Hard braking in an F1 carcan produce as much as 5 Gs.If the driver didn't havesomething holding them back,that force would send themstraight into the steering wheel.Modern harnesses areable to withstand a loadof almost 10 tons of force.The harness also needsto be able to stretchand give a little in the event of a crashso that the blow is softened.Even just a few milometerscan drastically cut downthe amount of bodily harm.But drivers also have to be ableto get out of their car quicklyin case it starts on fire.And that's why modern racingharnesses have a quick releaseso drivers don't have to fumble aroundwith six or seven straps.It's just a quick boop andthen they're running awayfrom their flaming car.(deep husky voice) He whomakes a beast out of himselfgets rid of the pain of being a man.(laughing)What is this show?Um, if you guys wannasee me release a finishMello death inspired record,give this video a like, dude.I think we can do it.I'm gonna listen backto those vocals and see.I'm gonna practice.I'm gonna practice.I'm gonna make sure thecamera's still rolling.Yep, we're good.One of the most significantsafety innovationsin the histor of racing is the helmet.(upbeat music)Helmets have been around inracing since the beginning.But they've evolved a lotfrom the cloth skull capsof the early 20th century.Thin leather helmetsand goggles were commonbut didn't provide much protection at all.I can't imagine why.In the 1920s and '30s, somedrivers used football helmetsor firefighter helmetsbecause they protected betterthan the racing helmets.We actually made a really coolevolution of racing helmetsa long time ago but still with sass.And you should check it out,I'll put it right there.Modern Formula 1 helmets arethe safest they've ever been.The outer shell is made of carbon fiberand has small, polycarbonate thinsto direct air around the driver's head.Because in open wheel racing,the driver's head affects the overallaerodynamics of the car.That's insane.Also, you're going so fastthat it might pull thehelmet off you're head.Those little thins keep it down,(stuttering) it's like havinga spoiler on your helmet.The inside of the helmet is Kevlar,molded around the specific driver's head.The visor also hasmultiple transparent sheetsthat can be pulled off in case debrisclouds the driver's vision.You know, tear offs.You've probably seen 'em.After Formula 1 driver Felipe Massatook a spring to thedome at 160 miles an hourwhile qualifying at the2009 Hungarian Grand Prix,a small carbon fibershield was added to the topof the visor.The force of the spring hitting his helmetwas equivalent to beingshot with an AK-47.Luckily, Massa recoveredand continued his careerafter the accident.He actually retired twice.To help the driver breathe,there are also ports for ventilation.But when it comes to airflow,NASCAR helmets have F1beat by a country mile.Modern NASCAR helmetshave a tube at the backthat connects to a fresh air intake.In flows through the tubeand around the driver'shead during a race.And that is crucial when thetemperature in stock carsclimbs bast 130 degrees in the (beep)-pitand up to 170 degrees by the pedals.Good Lord.Race drivers are known to loseup to 10 pounds of body weight from sweatduring a race.In addition to a helmet,modern drivers wear a HANS deviceor head and neck support.This device restrains thehead from whipping forwardin a crash.The straps and harness helpto reduce neck tension 81%and a total neck load of 78%.When unrestrained, drivers can suffera Basilar skull fracture,which is tragically what happenedto NASCAR legend Dale Earnhardt in 2001.Following Earnhardt's passing,NASCAR mandated that alldrivers wear a HANS device.Mercedes helped developed the HANs devicethat's been used in F1 since 2003.They're different systemsthan the ones used in NASCARbut they work on the same principle.So why is that, among all this innovationstriving towards having thesafest vehicle possible,that race cars don't have airbags?Well, there are two different approachesto safety that fill two different needs.And to understand why racecars don't have airbags,you have to understandwhat those needs are.Race cars have different safety needsthan passenger cars meant for the road.Comfort isn't a big aconcern in a race carbecause it's all about going fast.But comfort is a hugeconcern in road cars.You need room to move around, stretch,observe your surroundings,grab your coffee,adjust your mirror, whatever.All that requires space to move around.The more room you have in your car,the further your body is going to travelin the event of a crash.But that means there's moretime for your body to slow down.And that's what safetyfeatures in passenger cars do.They slow your rate of deceleration.The crumple zone is thefirst area of impact.It takes a lot of the force of the crashand slows the car down,dispersing the force over the whole car.As your body goes forwards,the seat belt restrains youwhile also giving a little bit of slackto slow your body down even more.As your body continues to move forward,the airbag expands tomeet your chest and faceand absorb that impact.Hopefully slowing your body down enough,that the next impact, yourorgans hitting your skeleton,doesn't completely turn you into jelly.Sounds delicious?Actually very uncomfortable.A race car has most of these featuresbut heavy duty versions of themto deal with the extra forceof going 200 miles an hour.Race cars have crumplezones much like road carsthat help disperse some of that energy.But that's where the two diverge.The biggest difference the twois the amount of spacebetween the driver's seatand the steering wheel.Race cars are built for speedwith driver comfort being less important.If the cockpit had any more space,that would directly impact the weightand aerodynamics of the car.So the cockpit is engineeredto be as compact as possible.Racing harnessing aredesigned to restrain a drivermuch more than a normal seat beltplus the HANS device.This is all to say that the driveris not moving much at all.So if an airbag went off,it wouldn't do it's intendedduty and slow the driver down.It might not even reach the driver.An airbag would probably makedriving an F1 car more dangerous.Rally drivers often hit curbsand get in small accidentsbut keep driving as iftheir car is totally fine.The truth is, minor impactscould set that airbag off,obstructing the driver'sview when they might needto get out of the way.And then they'd probably needto stop and replace the modulecosting them precious time on the track.And then there's theissue of engine fires.If driver crashed and the airbag went off,it would also make it a lot harderto undo the harness and get out of the carin the event of the fire.And that's probably theworst way you can go,trapped in a burning car.No thank you.On that horrifying note,thank you so much for watching.If you like this video guys,please give it a thumbs up.And we have this new thingcalled donut every day,we're posting every day.We have a car show forliterally everybody.If you like this, you'llprobably like our other shows.So hit that subscribe buttonto make sure you don't miss outbecause they're all great.Follow Donut on all social media.Thank you so much for watching.(deep husky voice) Be gone, snack time.