This Volvo safety concept was ahead of its time

We have never been able to blame Volvo for one thing: that the brand throws a hat on it when it comes to safety. The manufacturer invents the three-point seat belt in 1959 and then installs standard seat belts on the front seats in all models. The Swedes also take on a pioneering role when, after the publication of Ralph Nader’s book ‘Unsafe at any speed’ in 1965, a debate about road safety started in the US. This leads, at least in the US, to a drive for more safety with new road safety legislation, the establishment of the road safety authority NHTSA and in 1970 the Experimental Safety Vehicle (ESV) project of the US Department of Transportation (DOT). At Volvo, in the spring of 1971, development head Rolf Mellde enters the office of Arne Åsberg, who is then 31 years old. “He asked me how much money I needed to develop an experimental car that pushed the boundaries of safety,” recalls Åsberg. “I told him that I needed about 30 million Swedish kronor (converted to today’s money 2.95 million euros, ed.). That happened just before lunch, and the financing was completed that same afternoon.”

Stopping distance of 1.5 meters

The project is being developed on the basis of the P1560, a model that Volvo’s new director Pehr Gyllenhammar has just pulled the plug on. That car should replace the 140/160 model series, but the management decides to further develop the model series and market it as 240/260. The prototypes and bodies are then used in the VESC, the ‘Volvo Experimental Safety Car’. The newcomer grows 32 centimeters in length, 11 centimeters in width and is 250 kilograms heavier than the Volvo 140. Function clearly takes precedence over form. The most striking aspect is the bumpers that stick out for miles. Volvo engineers discover that a human needs a stopping distance of 1.5 meters to survive a collision at 80 km/h against a stationary object. For this reason, the VESC has a crumple zone of 110 centimeters and for the people sitting in the front, 40 centimeters of space is available to be slowed down via the seat belts, the front and rear airbags and upholstery parts. A roll-over bar, also visible from the outside, allows the VESC to be dropped onto its roof from a height of 2.4 meters, which is then depressed by only 75 millimeters. Pipes in the doors and additional door locks in the sills increase rigidity. Since the mid-1960s, Volvo has investigated 28,000 collisions, resulting in various safety measures. For example, the VESC car is equipped with an ABS braking system from supplier ATE and head restraints that automatically slide up in the event of a collision. Airbags in the parcel shelf should help limit damage in rear-end collisions, even if the term whiplash was not really in vogue at that time. A new suspension is intended to ensure that the engine slides under the passenger compartment in the event of a collision. The steering wheel retracts due to the impact energy, or so the idea is.

Today, the only surviving example of the VESC is in the Volvo Museum in Gothenburg. The car may not be started, but we do get a first impression of it. The seating position and the overview are excellent. We know details such as the brown carpet from other Volvo models from the same period. The way in which the prototype has been put together is both material and directive. Take, for example, the enormous (tube) monitor in the dashboard, which is linked to a camera in the rear.

“An employee traveled to Japan to buy a camera that would be mounted on school buses in that country. We have built in this system to replace a rear-view mirror. The rear view was fantastic,” said Åsberg.

In March 1972 Volvo presents the VESC to the Swedish press. “Safer than the ESV cars developed in the US,” reports ‘Vi Bilägare’ magazine, but the magazine also revives an old discussion. “According to the Americans, not much will happen if there is no seat belt requirement. That is why it was thought that only airbags should be installed,” says Claes Tingvall, former director of the Swedish safety authority. The VESC also tested seat belts that were attached to the doors and put on automatically. Tingvall: “’Vi Bilägare’ asked at the time whether we really needed that: an airbag system or seat belts that were put on automatically, since there were already good working seat belts.”

Short, but intense

The career of the VESC and the ESV cars is short but intense. When all ESV cars are shown to the world in Washington during the Transpo 72 trade fair in May of that year, the VESC will be at the entrance, because Volvo does not want to pay exhibition costs.

“But the first thing visitors saw when they entered the exhibition was the VESC,” recalls Åsberg. A year and a half later, the oil crisis has shifted the focus to low fuel consumption. ‘Vi Bilägare’ even writes that the safety car was dead. “Finally, we would like to add.” But that’s not quite right. Some details resulting from the ESV program have been made mandatory in the US as early as 1974, for example large bumpers that can withstand collisions at a speed of up to 8 km/h without damage. “The American insurance companies have stimulated this development. In the meantime, the car industry has succeeded in delaying the prescribed installation of airbags,” says Åsberg.

After the ESV program at Volvo has been discontinued, most safety features will remain in the future for a long time, but almost thirty years later almost everything has made its way into series production. Microsoft founder Bill Gates once said, “Humans have a tendency to overestimate technical innovations in the short term and underestimate them in the long term.”