Cadillac Mike says it’s actually the opposite case — their deep understanding of materials, loads, how parts interact with each other along with the ability to run hundreds, sometimes thousands of durability tests has engineers “accounting for variations we could never imagine before.” A notable example is the tough one-quarter overlap crash test where engineers can crash a digital vehicle over and over, gather vast amounts of data and modify parts in real time. The old way: run the prototype into the barrier, examine the wreck, glean what’s needed and send it to the scrap heap. And yes, some virtual crash results are now being accepted as official.