Ford Ranger: Safety first - it's the best

The Ford Ranger triumphed over top names, including Mercedes. Photo / Supplied

The new Ford Ranger has been praised in the annual European New Car Assessment safety awards as the safest ute tested by the organisation.

The finding is a feather in the cap for Ford Australia, which developed the new-generation Ranger in parallel with Mazda's BT-50.

The independent crash body does not have a specific category for utes in its annual awards, but highlighted the Ranger's maximum five-star crash-test performance in announcing its Best Cars of 2011.

"Special mention should be made of the Ford Ranger, the only pickup tested by Euro NCAP in 2011," it said.

"The Ranger is the safest pick-up yet tested by the organisation and scored highly in all areas of assessment, most notably in pedestrian protection."

Ford Australia brand communications manager Neil McDonald said the accolade validated the efforts of the engineers and designers who had worked on the Ranger project.

The diesel dual-cab Ranger last year scored 96 per cent for adult occupant protection. Only the Mercedes-Benz B-class scored higher with a 97 per cent rating.

But the Ranger blitzed the child and pedestrian protection categories with scores of 86 and 81 per cent against 81 and 56 per cent for the B-Class.

The latest Holden Barina - known as the Chevrolet Aveo in Europe - was judged the top achiever among the super-minis tested last year, and the new Ford Focus triumphed in the small-car class.

The Audi Q3 was rated best compact offroader, and Volvo's V60 wagon was best large family car.

Among the runners-up were the Mercedes M-Class, Toyota Yaris, Lexus CT200h, Hyundai ix20 and BMW X1.

Of these, the Toyota Yaris, Lexus CT200h and BMW X1 are on the New Zealand market, and the Mercedes M-Class is on its way.

The award-winners came from 53 new models tested by ENCAP last year.

Of these, about three-quarters achieved five stars, and 11 were rated four-star performers.

The dunce was the Romanian-made Dacia Duster - a compact SUV built on a Nissan platform by Renault's budget brand - which rated only three stars, and came in for stinging criticism from ENCAP engineers.

ENCAP tested the first electric cars in 2011, and Nissan's Leaf became the first EV to score a five-star rating.

ENCAP praised Volvo and Mercedes-Benz for their pioneering autonomous emergency braking (AEB) systems that use radar to detect an imminent collision and automatically brake the vehicle.

ENCAP secretary-general Dr Michiel van Ratingen said the tester would add AEB to the list of technologies required for a five-star rating.

"The safety case for AEB systems is very strong, and we are therefore strongly encouraging manufacturers to increase the availability of such systems on new cars," he said.

"We are well under way to add the assessment of these systems to the overall rating and to make these systems a requirement for five stars."

ENCAP has this year raised the bar for five-star achievement, demanding a 60 per cent pedestrian protection assessment - up from 40 per cent - as a minimum.

Under this change, only two of the five category winners in this year's awards - the Ford Focus and Volvo V60 - would retain five-star ratings.

The Ford Ranger would also remain a five-star vehicle, but the Mercedes M-class would drop a rung.