Why would the informed for life score on the Ford Freestyle differ so greatly.
2005 w/o SAB w/o ESC Medium Risk Score of 93
2006 w/o SAB w/o ESC Best 6% for 2006 Score of 65
2007 w/SAB w/oESC Best 10% for 2007 63
I am looking at a 2005 with SAB and AWD. I thought the freestly scored really well but now I am thinking that maybe it was redesigned after 2005 thus the score increase (minus the addition of airbags in the 2007).
OR do you think this is a mistake and the 2005 with SAB should technically score the same as the 2007?
Darren, Are you out there?
Heather
Unlike other safety compilations, Informed For Life uses actual statistics to combine the various safety factors into one rating. They give a pretty complete explanation of the studies and calculations involved.
The main variation from a model that is essentially unchanged from one year to the next (like Freestyle) is usually if one of those factors is missing. For example, in the case of a missing crash test result they give it a typical rating for the class, so that can affect the score until the crash test is completed. It's basically a guess based on class averages. For new vehicles, that will affect the results especially in the early years if not all the tests had been done yet.
The nice thing is that they also give you a calculator, so you can put in the inputs and see what the rating would be if you enter any missing results manually. That way, once the tests are done and depending what options you have, you can enter the information for what you own and see the actual rating. Since they do make data error entries sometimes, using the calculator makes sure you get it right.
For 2005, the Freestyle was missing IIHS results. It was only evaluated without either side curtain airbags (optional) or stability control (not available from 2005-2007). So, it got an average rating for the IIHS scores and that affected its overall rating.
In 2006, the IIHS frontal, side and rear tests had been done. It got top ratings all around with the optional side curtain airbags. In replacing those 2005 guesses that used class averages with the top IIHS ratings, the score improved even though the vehicle didn't change. They could have gone back and updated the 2005 table, but they chose not to do so.
For 2007, various models changed very slightly. It appears they made a very small change to their methodology for calculating the risk to front seat passengers in frontal crashes. The change from 65 to 63 is probably not very significant anyway. Again, they could have gone back and updated previous years with this change, but they didn't. They also added an entry for the Freestyle without optional side curtain airbags that got a score of 82, presumably because it lacked IIHS side impact tests in that configuration.
For 2008, the Freestyle (now the Taurus X) gets stability control and side curtain airbags both standard (finally!) and drops to a score of 54. That's the best score currently in the index! Of course, most models are missing data for 2008 so it's possible other models will be as good or better once the results are all available.
So, the only real change from 2005 to 2008 is the inclusion of stability control in 2008 and whether or not you had optional side curtain airbags in previous years. The lack of IIHS crash tests affected the score in 2005, but if you had the optional side curtain airbags available at the time, the 2005 model would have scored about 65 just like the 2006 model. Similarly, if you bought a 2006 without side curtain airbags, the score might be 65 or it might be worse. We just don't know without the side impact result from the IIHS [without side curtain airbags], so the 82 score is really a guess based on typical models in the class.
Does that make sense or did I make it too confusing?
It's really an elegant way of making a composite safety rating without being arbitrary. Many other publications have done this, but simply ignored missing ratings (that turned out to be poor later) or dismissed certain ratings altogether. Some weighted certain results much higher than was justified by actual statistics. That often led to a bias or incomplete rating that omitted some very safe models. At least with Informed for Life, you always have that calculator (
http://www.informedforlife.org/config_score.php ) to enter data manually. That lets you avoid any of the guesswork for missing results or errors in the table.
