Silver cars are less likely

Silver cars are less likely to be involved in serious accidents

Article from the British Medical Journal, Dec. 2003.

It makes me wonder if they took into account the safety equipment of the vehicle. Why? Brown cars, they note, have a signifigantly higher chance of serious injury. Car manufacturers don't really make brown cars anymore. They make gold, champagne, tan, but I don't really classify those as brown. Maybe they did. I think the last of the brown cars were made during the mid to late 80s, which was before the advent of cars with air bags and crumple zones, which makes a huge impact on the safety of the vehicles.

Yesterday, when I took the BMW into the shop to get the shift knob replaced (and do a few other minor things) they gave me as a loaner car, a brown 1980 BMW 320i. The 320i is the oldest car I have ever driven. It really makes me appreciate all the "luxuries" we take for granted.

Equipped with a 1.8L 4-cylinder 101 hp engine, the 320i goes 0 to 60 in a little over 9 seconds. It has a/c and heat, and includes a casette player -- but no radio, and no passenger side mirror. It also lacked all the little powered things we're used to: namely power steering and power windows. Power windows, I don't really care about, but power steering makes a huge difference in the way a car drives and feels. The other thing that changed the way the car drove was the pre-anti-lock brake system.

When I returned the car today, the mechanic asked me if I'd like to swap my 850 for their 320. I chuckled and said "never", truly appreciative of my 850. "Yeah," the mechanic said "I didn't think so. I can't imagine people ever thought that was a good car."