Even if the Dacia Jogger derives closely from the latest Sandero, Euro NCAP gave this adventurer station wagon a score half as good, with only 1 star. But this lackluster result deserves to be put into perspective, especially since there was not even a new crash test. Explanations.
For Dacia, poor results at Euro NCAP have become a bad habit. After the two stars obtained by the Sandero in the spring of 2021, then the only star collected by the Spring last December, it is the Jogger adventurer station wagon that returns home with a single star. However, he did not even have the right to a proper crash test. The European organization, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary, considered that the Jogger was technically derived from the Sandero to justify such an expense. An already debatable choice: if the entire front part is common to both models, the last-born benefits from a completely different central cell and stern. But it is above all the division of the note by two compared to the city car which makes Dacia cringe and which deserves to be explained… because it should in theory only apply to the seven-seater version.
2 theoretical stars in five-seater version
To justify its decision to remove a star, Euro NCAP relies in fact on the absence of witnesses of non-wearing of the seat belt in the third row. A point which therefore does not concern the five-seater versions. However, this does not prevent the entire range from seeing its score in the field of driving aids drop to only 39%, instead of 42% for the Sandero. A drop of 3% which no longer allows you to benefit from a second star in the eyes of the organization.
Euro NCAP sometimes assigns a different rating depending on the version. This is the case on the new DS 4, which receives four or five stars depending on the equipment it has. But the institution did not opt for this solution this time, while the 5-seater Jogger is theoretically well eligible for two stars. Dacia also has an acceptable explanation for the absence of a seat belt indicator on the last row of its seven-seater variants. As their two booster seats can be extracted from the passenger compartment, the addition of this equipment would have involved complex wiring, with risks of lack of long-term robustness. The Romanian brand has therefore deliberately chosen to dispense with it.
Not so alarming results
There is also a slight drop in points in the area of child safety compared to the Sandero, with a score that drops from 72 to 69%. A consequence of the Isofix fixings which are only compatible with a small part of the seats offered on the market in the third row. But all the other results are logically identical to those of the Sandero, and less alarming than Euro NCAP would have you believe. Even if it remains far from that of much more expensive competitors, the protection of adults remains indeed honorable, as evidenced by the 70% it obtains. More than the crash test itself, it is above all the lack of state-of-the-art driving aids which today strongly penalizes Dacias.
In particular, they pay for the absence of assistance for keeping in line… while our tests regularly show us that the effectiveness of this assistance today often remains very perfectible off the motorway, leading many users to deactivate it as quickly as possible. The Sandero and Jogger also pass away in the field of the safety of “vulnerable users”, the fault above all of an automatic emergency braking incapable of recognizing pedestrians and cyclists. But that is clearly not enough to catalog them as dangerous cars… and most buyers are not mistaken: you are always more numerous to rush on the latest innovations from the manufacturer, which are sometimes the only cars new to fit within your budget.
TO READ. Dacia Spring: only one star in Euro NCAP crash tests
