Did the S-197 have any changes to improve Safety Ratings in 2008?

BADDAZBLUE

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Dec 8, 2008

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• Dec 8, 2008

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I was researching the S-197 a bit, and looked up the Safety Ratings, and it looks like all years get a 5 Star frontal rating, but the '05-'07's get a 4 Star side ratings while the '08+'s get a 5 Star side rating according to to Safecar.gov (unfortunately the IIHS tested only a convertible and I'm looking into Hard Tops).

I know they got standard side Airbags in '08, so perhaps that has something to do with it, but am assuming they either didn't test a model with the optional side bags for the earlier years, or if they did, Ford must have made some structural changes in '08 to improve the side safety ratings?

 

69mach1-409

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Dec 9, 2008

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• Dec 9, 2008

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I believe Ford did some structural stiffening during the 07 production run in prep for the GT500.

 

Five Oh Brian

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Dec 9, 2008

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• Dec 9, 2008

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The 05-07 crash tests didn't reflect the optional side airbags, whereas the 2008's come standard with them and tested better.

The added structure in 07 for the GT500 was more about chassis stiffening and not so much about safety.

 

1

1965coupe

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Dec 10, 2008

#4

• Dec 10, 2008

• #4

Five Oh Brian said:

The 05-07 crash tests didn't reflect the optional side airbags, whereas the 2008's come standard with them and tested better.

Click to expand...

+1

The Shelby Gts all come standard with side seat airbags, whereas they are only standard on regular mustangs starting in 2008...

 

BADDAZBLUE

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• Dec 10, 2008

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Ahh, thanks

So the Model Year 2007 Mustangs had the chassis stiffening?

The '08's have strong Safety scores, good to know the structure of the car is the same in the earlier years.

How hard is it to find an '05-'07 GT with Side Air Bags out of curiosity?

 

Five Oh Brian

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#6

• Dec 10, 2008

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BADDAZBLUE said:

Ahh, thanks .... How hard is it to find an '05-'07 GT with Side Air Bags out of curiosity?

Click to expand...

Gonna be hit and miss, but at least the factory sewed a little tag at the top of the seats to easily identify which cars have them, so you can look through the side windows and easily spot it.

I order all the Mustangs for our dealership, and back in 05-07 I only ordered about 10% of our Mustangs with the side air bags. Don't know about the rest of the nation's dealers, but the take rate was likely a small percentage (below 25% ??? - just a guess). I'm a big believer in ABS brakes, though, so I ordered 100% of our Mustangs with ABS (optional on V6's, standard on V8's).

 

BADDAZBLUE

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Dec 11, 2008

#7

• Dec 11, 2008

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Thanks. Yeah I assume Side Bags are hugely difficult to come by with the pre-08's. I agree with the ABS, I wouldn't buy anything without ABS.