Barina adds two stars

The baby Barina is now far safer than it was, and almost up to the standard of the top selling Commodore, after a sales slide triggered by a sub-par score in Australian New-Car Assessment Program crash testing.

The Barina only scored a two-star rating after it hit Australia in 2006 but a major development program this year in Korea has seen that boosted to four stars in official NCAP ratings which become public this morning. (SUB: Thursday) NCAP is claiming credit for the improvement, and RACV chief engineer Michael Case said yesterday that GM Daewoo - which supplies the Barina to Holden - even invited a safety delegation to visit its base in Korea to help with improvements to the car.

"It shows that once people know (about a poor NCAP score) they respond by not buying that vehicle. Immediately after the result was published there was a lot of negative publicity," Case said yesterday.

"Safety became more top-of-mind ... and people responded. Clearly there was a move away from it, sales-wise."

"NCAP is claiming the credit for putting pressure on GM Daewoo, through Holden, to improve their safety performance. We tracked the sales of the Barina after our result was made public and there was clearly a connection."

Changes to the latest Barina, which went on sale in late July as a

2009 model, run deep and include everything from a stronger body structure to tougher B-pillars and standard side airbags.

GM Holden says the easiest way to pick the 'safer' Barina is by new sheetmetal on the front end, which looks distinctly different even though the car is still officially the same model.

It is trumpeting the four-star score for the Barina, which now matches the Commodore, Viva and Captiva. But even the Commodore falls short of the maximum five-star ranking of the safest Australian-made car, the Ford Falcon.

"This announcement confirms the effectiveness of our various safety improvements," the executive director for sales, marketing and after- sales at GM Holden, Alan Batey, said yesterday.

But Case said the changes would not have come without help from NCAP and the pressure which came from the Barina's sales slide. He also said that the change to a Korean-made Barina had seen the car's result slip from the four-star ranking of the previous model, which was designed and built in Europe.

"Clearly it was a cheaper product. GM Daewoo wanted to improve the result and a couple of Australian NCAP people went to Korea earlier this year," Case said.

"We spoke to them about what could be done to improve the performance of the car. It was clear they were committed to getting from two to four stars with the vehicle.

"They are now just across the line into four stars. They really focussed on the areas that would improve their score. They have taken more time to develop the vehicle."