DUAL-CAB SAFETY SYSTEMS SAFETY CHECK

DUAL-CAB ute safety is somewhat of a chicken or the egg question: Did dual-cab utes become the bestselling vehicles on Australian roads because they have increasingly offered the safety of conventional passenger cars or did their popularity, especially as family transport, mean that manufacturers needed to offer more and more safety kit to maintain their competitive advantage?

There are outside influences, too, including the Federal government mandating of electronic stability control (ESC) on light commercial vehicles (LCVs) from the end of 2017, and demands for five-star ANCAP ratings for Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S) from industry. Remember, the dual-cab you see as your ‘family car’ is still classified as an LCV by the government, and in lower-spec variants is used in work roles.

The upshot is that the popular dual-cabs sold today have much more safety kit than dual-cabs of 10 years ago. Interestingly, there’s considerable disparity in the amount of safety kit fitted to these popular dual-cabs despite all of them, plus the Chinese-made LDV T60, achieving a five-star ANCAP rating.

Some safety kit such as anti-lock brakes (ABS) and electronic stability control (ESC) is of course universal, while advanced safety features such as autonomous emergency braking (AEB) are only just finding their way onto dual cabs. And there are inherent design features such as full-time 4x4 that contribute to safety but aren’t often recognised as safety features.

All safety features, whether inherent or added on, either help prevent