How well do cars do in crash tests they're not optimized for?

The article reminds me of a story from a friend that was an engineer at a major water heater company. Modern electric water heaters are already fairly efficient, but every model gets tested by the government to be given an efficiency rating. The test consists of replacing the anode with a rod that has a series of temperature probes to measure the water at different levels in the water heater. Since water would form layers of different temperatures you needed…

> Unfortunately, if we get into a car accident, we don't get to ask the driver of the vehicle we're colliding with to change their location, angle of impact, and speed, in order for the collision to comply with an IIHS, NHTSA, or *NCAP, test protocol. I'm smitten with the stupid idea of teaching your self-driving car that when a crash can't be avoided it should attempt to make the crash as close as possible to the nearest crash test…

I'm surprised the "Actual vehicle tested may be different" section didn't mention the alleged fraud Ford engaged in with the 2015 F150 where they welded in extra crash safety bars only on specific configurations out of the factory... that just happened to be the exact configurations that were being sent to the IIHS for crash testing.