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Lamborghinis are "Designed to Split in Half" in Event of a Crash? We're Not So Sure

By Rain Noe - September 25, 2013

in Materials | Cars

Talk about schadenfreude. Seemingly every car blog in the world, and every local paper in NYC, has picked up the story of a Lamborghini crash last weekend in Brooklyn. The notable part of the crash: The $400,000 Aventador hits a tree and splits in half.

Luckily there were no fatalities in the crash, which occurred Saturday in the Mill Basin neighborhood of Brooklyn. But the part that we can't get over is that every single news organization is reporting, with no attribution whatsoever, that the Lamborghini is specifically designed to split in half in the event of a crash. Uh...what? CBS reported that "the Lamborghini severing in half...is a safety feature meant to help protect people inside the car. That safety feature may be the reason the driver was able to walk away from the crash." The Daily News claimed that "The [crash] shows exactly what manufacturers of the $400,000 ride had in mind by designing it to break apart easily on impact, a safety feature that lessens the energy involved in the wreck."

We're not sure this description is entirely accurate. Perusing websites that rate auto safety features, not a single one of them that lists the Aventador mentions there's a break-in-half design.

Here's what we do know: Although Lamborghini does not participate in factory-sponsored racing to the extent of their competitors, they're not above learning a thing or two from F1; thus the Aventador is designed around a carbon fiber monocoque, like an open-wheel car, encasing the driver in a strong but lightweight cage. Here's what it looks like:

It's simple physics that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. When this understanding is transposed onto a car, we can see it means that the weakest parts will break first; we saw the wheel come off of an F1 car here, presumably because the suspension struts are weaker than the monocoque, allowing the energy from the impact to shatter them.

What that means to us is that the Aventador's monocoque is simply the most rigid part of the car, and that the strength differential between the monocoque and the rest of the car means the rest of the car is likely to experience catastrophic structural failure before the monocoque. But the thought that Lamborghini designed one half of the car to go careening off into space, and possibly doing damage to cars or people well outside of the crash zone, sounds completely absurd to us.

Any of you car nuts have hard evidence that the car was, in fact, designed to split in half? We're happy to be proven wrong to further everyone's understanding of car design safety features.

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Peter Carrasquillo

5 years ago

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Well...this sort of crash happens often enough that if engine breakaway isn't intentional...well...then something is terribly terribly wrong. And from what I've been able to determine all of these drivers and passengers walked away.

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Max

10 years ago

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I think it's designed that way, we've seen gallardos, murcielagos and aventadors splitting in a half Lamborghini probably wouldn't let this happen with their newer cars if they didn't want to...
It's also a litlle understandable to me because the heavy parts like the engine have a lot of momentum in high speed crashes, and throwing them away results in a very lightweight cage that is more easy to stop by itself.
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Vlad

11 years ago

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This is a safety feature.

Many cars built around the carbon monocoque are designed this way.

Imagine driving that Aventador through an intersection and being clipped by somone on either rear quarter, the engine portion-back would detatch same as it did here when it hit a tree.

The Pagani Huayra is also designed the same way, where there are 7 Magnesium bolts holding the rear portion of the chassis to the Monocoque.

Saw both of these features explained in detail on the "Supercars" show featuring both the Aventador and Huayra.

Some cars have other interesting features like dropping the motor out of the car in order to let the crumple zones 'crumple' effeciently.
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Tazio Nuvolari

11 years ago

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Correct. "Life Cell' is designed into high end, monocoque, rear engined cars.

Engine is supposed to detach from passenger 'life cell' under certain circumstances so as take the punishment and NOT to transmit enegy to the occupants.

Similar to a classic motorcycle accident.

Learned 40 years ago that when a crashed motorcycle looks VERY good it often means the rider is DEAD. When the bike looks horrible, the rider survives.

Whenever the vehicle ABSORBS the extreme punishment and is essentially destroyed by the kinetic energy, it means that LESS energy is left to hit and destroy the passenger.

THAT is why Carbon Fiber and other composites like modern, advanced fiberglass, tend to work extremely well in occupant life preservation, much better than metal structures.

Looks like it worked in this instance. Airbags deployed and cell is intact = 100% occupant survival.

There is a GOOD REASON why highly advanced high technology costs FAR MORE than common technology.

Better engineers and better material safety standards..
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Andrew

11 years ago

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With any automotive vehicle, the cabin where the passengers is supposed to be designed to be rigid, while any external parts(engine bay, fenders, trunk) are designed to crumple. this disperses the energy around and away from the cabin. With high speed vehicles like F1 race cars and even speed boats, the cabin is designed to break away from the cabin to greatly disperse energy. the wheels on the F1 are teathered to the chassis so when they are deflecting the energy in a crash, the wheels stay somewhat attached to the vehicle. With carbon fiber, there is no flex in the material, so it breaks away in extreme stress. The nose cones on F1 race cars break into many tiny pieces when hit. each piece deflects the energy of the vehicle, bringing it to a stop. So in conclusion, the Lamborghini, with a carbon fiber cabin, would not be able to crumple in the event of an accident, so that "weak link" was intentionally put there.

Certificate degrees in automotive repair as well as Custom Fabrication from Washtenaw Community College, Michigan

How its made and How do they do it also have segments on the design of F1 cars.
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23c0n

11 years ago

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I'm pursuing a graduate degree in Automotive Technology, and even though I'm not an expert in structural integrity (my field is hybrid technology), I am confident this is not a design feature. This vehicle has its engine on the back, behind the monocoque. What this means is that the heaviest part of the car is right behind it. When you throw a hammer sideways towards a pole, you will see that the hammer will turn in the direction the head was traveling after hitting the pole. The same happens with the car. If it hits a tree sideways (that's what I understood, anyway), then the weight of the massive engine will create a bending torque. The monocoque is held in place to the rest of the chassis by a series of bolts. These bolts are not manufactured to withstand high shearing stresses, and thus gave way.

Anyway, that's what I think, but I bet someone from the industry would have a better idea. I'll see what I can find and get back to you.
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Clay

11 years ago

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I can't speak for Lamborghini in this case, but it seems to make sense. A lot of pure race cars (F1, Indy, and especially the Le Mans prototypes) are designed to throw components, body work, even engines and transmissions away from the car in case of a high-speed accident. It's all in the name of dispersion of kenetic energy. The engine and trans are easily the single biggest weight in the car, getting rid of them isn't going to hurt in a wreck. Granted, most of these race cars are at tracks where the crowd is protected, and these components (especially wheels) are generally tethered to the body.

Here's an excellent visual of Audi Factory driver Allan McNish's scary wreck at Le Mans in 2011. He was probably traveling 150+mph at the time of the crash and walked away completely unscathed. Despite the scary shower of carbon fiber, wheels, and other race car bits, no one else was injured either. Another wreck in a team car at night (there's no real video of that wreck) saw a car completely destroyed except for the safety cell. That wreck was at close to 220mph and the driver, Mike Rockenfeller, only had a headache afterwards.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JW3NDGk6YQE
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peterwyattmiddleton

11 years ago

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Correct, the car was designed to dissipate energy by allowing non integral parts of the "safety tub" to dismantle absorbing energy. I am surprised it is taking this long for this philosophy to make it to street cars as it has been used in race cars for decades now.
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Armando

11 years ago

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I read somewhere that they are designed to break in half to separate the Flammable Components from the driver. Remember the wreck between the SLR and Enzo (Malibu 2006) ? The Engine from the Enzo was about 1/4 away from the cockpit.
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