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The need for a consumer information on car safety is growing steadily. Up to now, the consumer information about crash-tested new cars has been provided, but this should be supplemented by safety ratings based on real-world accidents which reflect all types of accident circumstances. The possibilities and limits of the necessary ""Quality Criteria for the Safety Assessment of Cars based on Real- World Crashes'' are analyzed in an EU project in cooperation of research institutes, industry and universities. The paper summarizes the results of three major objectives within this ""SARAC'' project. - The existing rating procedures worldwide have been analyzed and are described by their methods and the assessment criteria/crash parameters used.

The paper examines the application of six vehicle safety rating systems to a common crash database, for the purpose of making a comparison of the rating results produced by each system and to develop an understanding of the differences which emerge. The rating results are compared based on rank order of crashworthiness of vehicle models, and relationships between each pair of results. Finally, the results with their respective confidence limits are used to classify each vehicle model as having inferior, not defined or superior crashworthiness, and the classification is used to compare the relative discrimination of the methods.