AEB compulsory for 2019 carsales Car of the Year

The carsales Car of the Year award will again ramp up its safety requirements in 2019.

Following on from previous years’ requirements for standard reversing cameras and mandatory crash rating minimums, to be eligible for entry into this year’s Shell V-Power sponsored award vehicles must include at least low-speed autonomous emergency braking (AEB) as standard equipment across all model variants.

“AEB is a potentially life-saving technology,” said carsales Editor in Chief and Director of Content, Mike Sinclair.

“In this first step we believe low-speed AEB is a must. In future years, we will consider adding high-speed AEB and other active safety systems to the list of must-haves.”

Many manufacturers have proactively added low-speed AEB (sometimes called City Safety) to their vehicles, but unlike anti-lock brakes and stability control, at this stage the technology is not mandatory in Australia.

Crash testing authorities across the globe are developing testing protocols for this rapidly evolving active safety technology, the best examples of which include pedestrian and cyclist detection at all speeds both day and night.

“This area of auto technology and its effect on crash ratings is a moving feast at the moment. As such we’ve chosen to mandate the technology for our award, rather than an arbitrary crash test rating,” Sinclair explained.

“We hope this will be an easier line in the sand for consumers to understand.

“That means for 2019 and probably 2020, we have not mandated a five-star ANCAP [or equivalent] crash rating standard. It is something we will revisit, however.

“We’re also examining which partners we can work with to measure the effectiveness of the systems from car to car as part of our award process. Those partnerships will not be in place for 2019, but we think it’s important to examine our options ahead of future awards,” he said.

In another important change for this year’s Carsales Car of the Year presented by Shell V-Power, light commercial vehicles have been removed from the running. Instead, carsales has established its Best Commercial Van and Best 4x4 Dual-Cab Ute awards as separate entities. carsales ‘Best’ awards will conducted and awarded at appropriate times through the calendar year.

In addition to the fitting of a reversing camera and AEB as standard across the model range, basic eligibility for the 2019 carsales Car of the Year presented by Shell V-Power requires that all vehicles:

- Must be series production passenger cars or SUVs available via dealers or similar distribution chain
- Must be substantially updated or a new variant on sale prior to December 31, 2019 and available locally at the time of carsales field testing (vehicles unavailable for testing can be carried over to subsequent years)
- Must have at least one variant in the range with a RRP of less than $250,000

Field testing for the 2019 carsales Car of the Year presented by Shell V-Power award will again be conducted in the Albury/Wodonga region and use the facilities of Wodonga TAFE. In 2019, 12 judges from the carsales team will participate.

During field testing the vehicles will be examined against key criteria including: Dynamics and Safety; Innovation and Technology; Practicality and Presentation; and Cost of ownership.

This last important criteria examines factors such as value for money, retained value, warranty, after-sales support and projected cost of running and is curated and provided by RedBook.

The finalists for the 2019 carsales Car of the Year presented by Shell V-Power will be formally announced next week, with the single 2019 carsales Car of the Year and two runners-up being announced on November 12.