Ready for its Next Accident

Ready for its Next Accident

In every industry there is steady talk of rapid change and the need to be prepared for this change. The collision repair industry is no different and those of us working in collision repair have been hearing of big changes for many years. Very often these warnings of big changes could be met with only relatively small evolutionary adaptations. These allowed us to continue to offer high quality, safe work over the years, and many operators started to not pay too much attention to the claims and warnings of rapid change.

This time the change is real, rapid and affecting all aspects of the industry very significantly.

There is an invisible component of vehicle performance which has no affect on the car or its performance until it is needed, which is hopefully not often. That invisible component is energy management in a car accident. For many years safety was built in through the use of more or heavier materials and these cars were not difficult to repair. With smaller and lighter cars, and higher safety standards innovation beyond simply more or heavier was needed.  At the design stage this is now carefully thought out and then built into the car, through the use of metals and other materials of varying strengths and characteristics.

A car can be repaired to look and drive exactly as it did before the accident, but if the repair facility had not utilized all the available information and equipment to perform correct structural repairs the car will not perform to its design capabilities in another accident.

With all the important issues and minor diversions that everyone has to constantly deal with post car accident energy management may not be top of mind. At Tsawwassen Collision we repair the cars you will be driving after the repair and are very aware of the importance of the car being ‘Ready for its Next Accident.’