Ingenieur Vol.70 Apr-June 2017 ingenieur Apr-June 2017-FA | Page 19

Role of VTA and NCAP in the automotive layout Source: ASEAN NCAP, 2013 by the Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs). A notable evidence of such claim can be seen for a certain car model that is supposed to be the so called “global car” which has a different body strength between two market origins, i.e. scored excellent rating in developed country’s market but obtained poor result in another market, e.g. in the case of South American cars as assessed by Latin NCAP (Fox News Latino 2013) and also from Indian market as tested by the Global NCAP (Global NCAP 2014). One of the strategic projects the Malaysian Institute of Road Safety Research (MIROS) initiated was the NCAP programme, initially codenamed “MyNCAP” – Malaysia New Car Assessment Programme. Major fundamental work began in 2008, which included a benchmarking process and designing the crash test laboratory (Khairil Anwar and Zulhaidi 2014). A “precursor programme” for NCAP called the Malaysian Vehicle Assessment Programme (MyVAP) was also introduced to primarily familiarize OEMs with the domestic NCAP environment (Aqbal Hafeez et al. 2010). From 2009 until 2012 four models from the national car producers, Proton and Perodua, were assessed – a signal of mixed reactions among other OEMs (Khairil Anwar and Zulhaidi 2014). In December 2011, MIROS and Global NCAP successfully signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to establish NCAP for the Southeast Asian region (Khairil Anwar and Zulhaidi 2014) in conjunction with the United Nation’s Decade of Action (DOA) for Road Saf ety Car safety rating programme (NCAP) on the world map. Source: ASEAN NCAP, 2013 2011-2020 (World Health Organisation 2011). To date, ASEAN NCAP is the newest addition to NCAP, comprising nine such programmes across the globe. The first official test at MIROS Crash Test Laboratory (MIROS PC3) in May 2012 marked the beginning of ASEAN NCAP assessment, in which the first group of tested cars came from Malaysia and Thailand. The pilot phase which was successfully executed in three sub-phases (Phase I – III), consisted of 27 models (30 car ratings; including three cars with two different variants i.e. Proton Saga, Toyota Corolla Altis and Kia Picanto) drawn from three ASEAN countries’ as well as Japanese CBUs. Once the pilot phase was declared “successful” by the Interim Committee (Steering and Technical Committee – SC & TC), ASEAN NCAP continued with the assessment of seven more cars. 17