Many people believe the three-point safety belt has not changed over the past forty years. They are right. And wrong. The belt's ingeniously simple basic design is the same. The difference today is that the belt is part of a high-tech safety system under constant development.
Few people have saved as many lives as Nils Bohlin - the Volvo engineer who in 1959 invented the V-type three-point safety belt. A design as obvious as it was intelligent, perfectly suited to the seat occupant's body. To this very day, the safety belt still provides the most effective protection in the event of an accident.
Saving a life can be so simple: grab, stretch, click! If you are wearing a safety belt, your chances of surviving a collision improve by 50 percent. The three-point belt is and will remain the car's most vital safety detail. However, even more lives could be saved if belt usage increased.
The Crash-Test Dummy family does invaluable work in the development of tomorrow's ever-safer cars. The dummies may cost anything up to 1.5 MSEK, and at Volvo Cars there are more than 100 members of this tough family.
His Royal Highness Prince Michael of Kent has awarded Volvo Cars a special international award(1) to mark the 50th Anniversary of the invention of the three-point safety belt and in acknowledgement of the company's vision to design cars that should not crash.
Volvo Cars was invited to donate its historic three-point safety belt to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. The museum will officially accept the gift at a ceremony today, July 14. The safety belt is part of a larger collection from eight different donors in which each article represents a significant aspect of 75 years of safety-enhancement work in the car industry.