G-Wiz that's safe!

I hate G-Wiz cars. They look puny and stupid. Yes, I know that one day they'll save the planet, but, quite frankly, if you can't run the windscreen wipers and headlights at the same time it's just not worth buying.

My flatmate and I were walking into university the other morning when we espied several consecutively on the roads. Green cars seem to be fashionable these days- every celeb seems to own a bloody Prius. I pondered aloud that if I were to be hit by a G-Wiz, I would probably crush the bonnet and be left without a blemish on me. Well, I've finally got round to doing the maths.

I'm going to assume that injury is directly related to momentum (i.e. I'm ignoring where exactly on the body the car hits and I'm also assuming that the same amount of bonnet hits). Now, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents states that "hit by a car at 30 mph, about half of pedestrians will live." 30mph is exactly 13.4112 m/s (courtesy of google calculator). I know this is very rough estimate, but I'm going to use that as my benchmark. I also found out that the average weight for a car in Europe is 1175kg (again, I'm not completely sure about the validity of this figure, but it's the best I have). I'm going to add on 70kg for a driver, and, say 10kg for general stuff in the car, making a total weight of 1255kg. So, using the old momentum=mass x velocity sum, a 50% fatality thingy would be about 16831kg.m/s

Now, the ever educational wikipedia states that the Reva G-Wiz weighs 745kg and can hold a maximum cargo of 270kg, but seeing as I only gave my average car an extra 80kg I'm going to call it a round 825kg. So, using my 50% fatality momentum figure of 16831kg.m/s, the G-wiz would have to be going 20.4m/s to stand a reasonable chance of killing someone- thats 45.6mph. I don't have enough faith in the 0-60mph of the G-Wiz in the stop start streets of London to believe it could ever get up enough speed to have more than a 50% chance of causing a fatality. In fact, on checking wikipedia, it doesn't have a 0-60mph time as its maximum speed is a miserable 50mph. Rubbish

In the immortal words of Boris from Goldeneye, I am invincible!