Bumper Safety

In the olden days, bumpers protected a vehicle from body damage in low speed collisions. Don't get us wrong, they still do; but, as bumper designs have evolved, so have their level of protection. To make the bumper even more vulnerable, the federal government's impact-test requirements were dropped from 5 mph to 2.5 mph in 1982. Think about that: a healthy person walks faster than 2.5 mph.


So, here's a brief history of the decline of the bumper, which should encourage readers to either look into beefier aftermarket bumpers or drive more defensively and very carefully.

Bumper Function
The function of the bumper is to absorb crash energy without significant damage to the bumper itself and no damage to the vehicle's front or rear end. Generally speaking, today's bumpers are made with a reinforcement bar of steel, aluminum, fiberglass composite or plastic with a plastic cover. The system includes crash absorbing mechanisms that compress on impact, such as polypropylene foam or plastic honeycomb. The most effective bumpers are positioned with distance between the reinforcement bar and the vehicle's sheet metal.


To guarantee that automotive bumpers worked well, the federal government developed safety standards in the early 1970s. The first standard prohibited damage to safety related equipment in low-speed, 5-mph crashes.

Prohibitive Damage
The next phase, effective for 1979 models, prohibited damage except to bumpers and their attachments in low speed crashes. These standards only applied to passenger cars, not the generic light-truck category that includes pick-ups, SUVs and vans or minivans.