On March 7, the China Automobile Center announced the results of the fifth batch of C-NCAP evaluations in 2021, and its Dongfeng Citroen Versailles C5 X was unexpectedly awarded the "Five Star" rating.
The reason why the Versailles C5 X will receive a five-star evaluation of C-NCAP is that it has already won the evaluation of China's top ten body bodies in 2021 at last year's "China Automotive Safety Conference & China Body Conference". The evaluation of China's top ten car bodies contains five dimensions, one of the most important dimensions is the active and passive safety design of the whole vehicle and the body.
The Versailles C5 X has won the award of the top ten body bodies, which shows that its safety has been recognized by professionalism in the industry.
The so-called layman looks at the bustle, and the insider looks at the doorway. How did the Versailles C5 X achieve both the C-NCAP evaluation procedure and the Chinese Body Congress?
We may wish to combine the body structure, configuration and test score of the Versailles C5 X to make an in-depth analysis of its active and passive safety design.
Occupant protection: "Top 10 Body" level safety design
In the C-NCAP evaluation procedure, the evaluation of occupant protection occupies 70% of the weight, which is also the basis for determining whether a vehicle is safe to drive.
Occupant protection includes three items: complete frontal crash test, side crash test, and bias crash test, mainly to test whether the body structure and seat belt, airbag, etc. can effectively protect the safety of members during the impact of the vehicle. The Versailles C5 X scored 91.3% in the C-NCAP occupant protection evaluation, and its score values were higher than the industry average, and the side touch even got a full score of 20 points, which can be said to be very good in protecting the safety of occupants.
In all three tests, the body was in good order, the main structure of the crew compartment was not significantly damaged or invaded, and the air curtains and airbags achieved timely and accurate ignition.
Positive touch
Bias touch
Side bump
In three tests of occupant safety, the Versailles C5 X guarantees good integrity and is closely related to its advanced body design concept. For example, in order to improve the stiffness of the body, the proportion of high-strength steel used in the Versailles C5 X is as high as 80%, while the proportion of most models of the same level in the industry is only about 70%, of which a large number of thermoformed steels with tensile strength of 1500MPa are also used in the key areas to improve collision safety (red parts in the figure).
Schematic diagram of the Collision Transmission Path of the Versailles C5 X
Moreover, DPCA's engineers not only rely solely on material stacking to improve the safety of the body, but also take into account the lightweight design of the body, reduce the weight of the body, and improve the fuel economy of the vehicle. For example, the thermoforming TWB technology (unequal thickness thermoforming laser welding plate) is used in the B-pillar to make the upper part of the B-pillar hard, protect the crew compartment body from being squeezed, and make the soft place in the lower part of the B-pillar soft to achieve sufficient energy absorption.
Collision-proof beam energy absorber for versailles C5 X
For example, the front and rear anti-collision beams are designed with aluminum alloy, which has a lighter weight than high-strength steel, better energy absorption and protection effect. Moreover, the energy absorption box design of the Versailles C5 X anti-collision beam is different from the traditional quadrilateral, and the engineers of Shenlong designed the energy absorption box into a hexagonal structure with the best internal and external force transmission through the extrusion process, which makes the anti-collision beam assembly of Versailles C5 X find the optimal balance point in the energy absorption and collision transmission, which can effectively reduce the intrusion of the engine and other structures to the crew compartment during the frontal collision accident and improve the safety of the occupants.
This is perhaps one of the reasons why the Versailles C5 X has been able to achieve good results in two positive occupant protection tests.
Proactive safety and pedestrian protection
Technology empowers safety to be one step ahead
Of course, the excellent performance in the field of occupant protection does not allow the Versailles C5 X to receive a five-star C-NCAP rating, after all, the evaluation of pedestrian protection and active safety also occupies a 30% weight. In both areas, thanks to the blessing of technology, the Versailles C5 X has the same level of better pedestrian protection and active safety.
Active hood hinge
For example, in the field of pedestrian protection, in order to take into account the relatively low shape of the front of the car, but also to ensure that the vehicle protects the head of the pedestrian in the event of an impact with a pedestrian, the Versailles C5 X is equipped with an active hair mask technology that is rare in the same class. This technology can recognize the impact between people and vehicles in advance through acceleration sensors, and then the engine cover rises up before the collision between the person's head and the hood to form a buffer space, effectively protecting the pedestrian's head from greater damage.
For example, in the field of active safety, versailles C5 X is equipped with an ACC that can achieve automatic parking in the range of 0 to 180km/h (many models of the same level can only achieve a range of more than 30km/h to follow the car), and the AEBS3 composed of cameras and millimeter-wave radar, so that the driving of Versailles C5 X can identify risks such as rear-end collisions in advance under various road conditions, and can also properly liberate the driver's feet, making driving both safe and intelligent and convenient. As a result, the Versailles C5 X received a high score of 97.71% in the C-NCAP's active safety evaluation.
At the same time, the Versailles C5 X is also equipped with speed limit sign recognition SLI, rear traffic through the RCTA and other configurations, so that it has L2.5 level of automatic assisted driving capabilities.
High standards of design and manufacturing
Global quality
In the selection materials of this year's China Body Congress, we have noticed that the safety design of the Versailles C5 X follows global standards, considering both the domestic C-NCAP, C-IASI and national standards, but also considering the European E-NCAP and STELANTIS Group's global model design standard STLA, taking into account more than twenty crash test procedures, based on which it is not difficult to understand why the Versailles C5 X can appear to be comfortable in the evaluation of C-NCAP.
2021 China Body Conference
The high standard of safety design in the global market has made the Versailles C5 X higher than similar models in China at the beginning of its birth, which may be one of the reasons why the Versailles C5 X can conquer the judges of the Chinese Body Safety Conference and export to many countries and regions.
In addition, the high standards of the Versailles C5 X are not only in design, but also in production, which was born in the Chengdu plant, the benchmark factory of Stellantis. The Chengdu plant of Dongfeng Citroen Versailles C5 X is the only production base in the world, and in the benchmarking of 22 global vehicle factories of Stellantis Group, it has been evaluated as the first in comprehensive performance for fifteen times, ranking at the forefront of various performance rankings for a long time.
The high standard of design quality, coupled with the manufacturing process of the global benchmark factory, makes the Versailles C5 X have the quality assurance of making in China and selling worldwide. With this, in March this year, thousands of Versailles C5 X were sold to many countries and regions, refreshing the record of the largest bicycle export ever recorded by DPCA, and according to the current recognition of versailles C5 X in domestic and foreign markets, the record is bound to be constantly refreshed.
Take user safety as the center to care for users
Users use sales to give back to DPCA
Versailles C5 X can be recognized in the evaluation of various automotive authorities, in fact, it is not a particularly surprising result, after all, in the field of automotive safety, DPCA has always been customer safety as the center, and the high standard of safety performance is engraved in the gene of the product.
The first car crash test in the history of China's automobile industry was selected by DPCA's Fukang sedan, which was completed by Tsinghua University on June 18, 1998, and all the indicators at that time were better than the relevant indicators of China's national standards and US federal motor vehicle safety regulations, so it was called "China's first collision".
After this, C-NCAP and other safety evaluation agencies were formally established, and the products of DPCA have repeatedly included the five-star evaluation of C-NCAP in turn. Based on the consistent excellent performance of DPCA in the field of automotive safety, at the 2016 C-NCAP 10th Anniversary Event, DPCA won the "C-NCAP 10th Anniversary Safety Achievement Award".
The persistent persistence of DPCA under high standards stems more from the company's strong R&D system and global and platform-based product standard process. It is also based on the company's product development concept of user safety as the center and providing users with a safer security. This insistence on the high quality of products has also allowed its products to gradually be recognized by the market.
In March this year, the versailles C5 X configuration was further enriched, and at the beginning of the month, another new achievement created with users was launched - the purchase of cars can be freely selected with 18-inch wheels, which will inevitably continue to be popular in the domestic market, coupled with the opening of the export market, the overall sales of DPCA is bound to play a beautiful turnaround battle in 2022.
Roundup: Versailles C5 X has been highly sought after by the consumer market since its listing last year, in addition to its super high appearance, cross-level configuration and high cost performance of the whole vehicle, it is also inseparable from its high standard of safety performance and high-quality vehicle texture. Rather than saying that the Versailles C5 X has taken the safety standards of this class of models to a new level of globalization, it is just a persistent insistence of DPCA in the field of automotive safety.