When people hear the term “black boxes”, they likely immediately think of the boxes in planes that can help determine what caused a plane crash. However, cars may also have black boxes, but they aren’t the same as what you would find on an airplane. It can be extremely helpful to know whether or not your car has one and where you can find your car’s black box.
Chances are your car likely has a black box in it. Most major brands of car manufacturers have been including them since 1994, while other manufacturers started in the 2000s.
Reading on, you can learn everything that you need to know about black boxes in cars and what their purpose is. The idea of black boxes can be daunting to car owners, but they can serve a very important purpose.
What is a Car Black Box?
Also known as an “EDR” (event data recorder), this is a recording device that is manufactured from highly durable crash-resistant materials. The black box is a device that is supposed to record the specific moments that led up to an accident so that the investigators can better determine what caused this accident. This can help prevent similar types of accidents in the future.
While a black box on the airplane records a lot of data, a black box in a car is not required to record as much information. The data for a car is stored on flash memory and the black box goes by different names depending on the car manufacturer. This is part of a safety system that will determine a developing collision and if there are any safety devices that should be deployed. Then, it will deploy any device that is necessary. Recording the crash is a secondary function of the black box system.
Do All Cars Have Black Boxes?
Chances are that your car does have a black box. Car brands like Chevrolet, Cadillac, and Buick have included black boxes in their cars as far back as 1994. According to Edmunds, about 96% of cars today have a black box built-in. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), about 64% of passenger vehicles had some type of black box capabilities. The NHTSA wanted to make this a requirement federally, but that hasn’t happened yet.
While most cars manufactured after 2014 has a black box, this isn’t a guarantee that your car will have one. You can check your owner’s manual to see if your car has one. There is also a list online that you can check to see if your car has one. This is important information to know because it will help you in case you end up in a car accident.
What Does the Black Box Record?
Many people are concerned about their privacy. They don’t want their information to be used in ways that don’t benefit them. The good news is that everyone cannot access this information. There are specific laws in various states that make it so that only specific people can access this information, particularly only people who have your permission. If they don’t have your permission, they won’t be able to access this information. In these cases, they would need to get a court order to access this information.
There is specific data that is recorded by this black box, which is especially helpful in preventing future accidents where possible. There are 15 parameters that are required to be recorded should a manufacturer include a black box in the car. Some of these parameters include:
- Speed change (lateral/longitudinal Delta-V)
- Engine throttle percentage
- Vehicle indicated speed
- Crash ignition cycles
- Download ignition cycles
- On/off brake status
- Driver safety belt status
- Whether or not you were wearing a seat belt
- Airbag deployment time
- Force of impact
There is also additional data that manufacturers can voluntarily record, around 30 types of data to be specific. This includes recording the input from the steering wheel or the activity of the anti-lock braking system (ABS). They may also be able to record audio or video as well as potentially track your GPS location.
Where is My Car’s Black Box?
The exact location of your black box will depend on your car. For the most part, this system is built into the airbag system. What makes this concerning is when people decide that they want to try to remove these devices, they end up causing their airbag to not deploy should there be a car accident. This can lead to potential safety concerns, especially for more serious car accidents. This happens when the black box is not safely removed. You should not attempt to remove this yourself, as this can lead to a variety of different problems.
Not only can there be safety issues by improperly removing the black box system, but there may also be laws that you could break by tampering with these devices.
Why Do You Need Your Vehicle’s Black Box Data?
If you have been in a car accident, the black box recorder information can be an essential piece of evidence in your case. A personal injury insurance claim can be difficult to prove, but with enough evidence, you can increase your chances of a successful out come to your legal case. This section will take a closer look at why you need your car’s black box data.
One of the best ways that you can personally use this data is to help you with your personal injury claim. This data can be especially useful in these situations:
- Helping to establish what happened in cases of fatal accidents
- Helping to establish what happened in cases where neither party remembers the accident
- Helping to establish in cases where the testimony may be contradictory, helping see what really happened
- Helping to establish the magnitude of any movement of the vehicle that was impacted in order to see if there was enough of an impact to cause injury
As you can see, the black box data can be extremely valuable in helping you establish your personal injury legal case.
However, it’s important that you take the necessary steps to preserve this black box data. This is because the car’s black box data is recorded over on a regular basis. This makes it especially important to act quickly in order for you to preserve the valuable black box data. You may only have about 30 days before your black box starts to record over the accident data. If your car accident involved a commercial vehicle, the data can be destroyed by the company in order to protect themselves from a lawsuit.
A legal professional can give you advice about your car’s black box data and what you can do to best preserve this data. They can use this data in order to better help your personal injury legal case.
Conclusion
A car’s black box can be extremely beneficial to people, especially since they can track accident data to prevent accidents in the future. While many people do have some significant concerns about their privacy when it comes to black boxes in their vehicles, these are devices that can serve some great purposes for you. This is especially true if you were in an accident as a result of someone else’s negligence. You can use this information in order to fight for the money that you deserve from an insurance claim after an accident. If you’re uncertain whether or not you have a black box, you search the web for websites to find out if your car has a black box system.
