I got curious and went out and looked through over 20 76/77 and they are all plastic and none broke. I had one set from a 78 and they are plastic. It is odd though that they are plastic but im sure the guy designing them wasnt looking 40 years out.
Heat kills plastic.
If it were me id slap a used one in and run it, I mean seriously as long as it works keep in mind statistically in our 40 year old cars were 3 times more likely to die in a serious crash.
This only shows back to 84 and this shows your over 2x more likely, so if your really really worried about safety maybe a newer car is for you. You can only do so much with our old junk.
And now the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has released data compiled as part of the agency’s Fatality Analysis Reporting Systemthat confirms the notion that newer vehicles tend to be inherently safer than older ones.
Specifically, NHTSA determined that a higher proportion of passengers in more-dated vehicles are killed in crashes than are those riding in recently minted models. The difference in fatality rates between vehicles built prior to 1984 is more than double that recorded for models sold between 2013 and 2017.
To quote the study’s findings, "Using the most recent fatal crash data, this analysis supports previous research in finding that a higher proportion of the occupants of older MY vehicles suffered a fatal injury. In addition, the proportion of vehicle occupants who were fatally injured increases with the age of the vehicle."
Specifically, here’s how NHTSA’s data breaks down the frequency of fatalities in crashes by model year:
- 1984 and earlier: 55%
- 1985-1992: 53%
- 1993-1997: 46%
- 1997-2002: 42%
- 2003-2007: 36%
- 2008-2012: 31%
- 2013-2017: 26%
kly