Poor crash test results for the big-selling Holden Barina seem certain to trigger modifications to improve its safety performance.
Holden managing director Denny Mooney told Sunday Drive last week that engineering work was under way at GM Daewoo in South Korea, where the Barina is built.
He stopped short of confirming that structural changes had been approved for production, but said a fix should flow through before the end of this year.
"We are looking at it," he said. "I say that in all seriousness because I am committed to making the car perform as best we can."
In February, the Chevrolet Aveo - sold in Australia as the Barina sedan - scored two stars out of a possible five in a European New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) crash test. And in May, the Barina hatchback scored two stars in an Australian NCAP test.
Both cars were criticised for their likelihood of causing serious chest injury to the driver in a frontal impact. The Aveo's result included a strike through, indicating the potential for life-threatening injury.
"I think that [poor rating] caught us and our GM Daewoo engineers off guard," Mooney said." Our internal data said it was a three-star car.
"We have had our engineers here working with the GMDAT engineering group on the results and having a dialogue on whether there is opportunity for us to make changes to improve the score.
"We'd try to get it to the best performance we think we can. Certainly three stars."
While he was prepared to concede the Barina's NCAP performance required attention, Mooney stressed that the car was safe.
"I drive the car and I don't have any problem," he said. "My daughter drives the car and I don't have any problem. I am very confident in the car's safety."
The Barina is a rebadged Daewoo Kalos, sold in Australia since late 2005. The previous Barina was sourced from Opel in Europe and earned a four-star rating from NCAP in 2002. Holden has received widespread criticism for introducing a new model that had a poorer safety rating than the car it replaced. Despite the negative publicity, the Korean Barina has been a big hit for Holden.
Originally priced from an ultra-competitive $12,990 - its price now starts at $13,490 - it has sold about 1300 units per month, almost double the previous Barina. In May sales fell back to their old levels.
Mooney said supply issues and the $500 price rise impacted on sales, but mass media coverage of the poor crash results was also starting to have an effect on sales.
"That publicity did not help, there is no question about that," he said.
While he was cautious in his public statements, other Holden executives privately expressed no doubt the two-star rating had hurt sales. They are also convinced NCAP-driven modifications are definite for Barina.
The most likely outcome will be reinforcing the chassis rails with additional welds to better cope with the NCAP 64kmh offset deformable barrier test. This would also mean retuning of the dual front air bags and seatbelts.
The modifications would not only apply to Barina, as the Daewoo mini is sold in 95 countries under various GM brand names.
Meanwhile, Mooney confirmed that Holden has cautious sales expectations for its all-new VE Commodore due in August.
The current nine-year old Commodore has been a record seller for the company, topping out in 1998, when 94,642 were sold in Australia. But spiralling fuel prices, which have cut deeply into all locally manufactured large car sales, would continue to have an impact when the new car goes on sale, Mooney said.
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Originally Posted by SlickHolden
....... I'll check
