Here is my experience with Pintos. The frame design was wrong. When these cars got hit from behind the frames buckled over the differentials. Thus the back end of the car would fold under and the gas tank would hit the differential and split open and be ignited by usually the exhaust or sparks. The plastic gurved plate helped this quite a bit. The frames still buckled, but gas tanks did not rupture from hit the back of the diffys. They then slid more on the plastic.
People use to say the gas tank was too closeto the bumper, yet Datsun and Toyota's were right by the bumper by 2"'s.
I fixed afew Pintos in the shops when younger and this is what we foundthen.

 

The other issue was the filler necks didn't extend far enough into the tanks.

When the tank was pushed forward, the filler neck was forced out of the tank, causing all the gas to be dumped onto the ground.

The kit sent to all the dealers included the curved plastic shield, a longer filler neck and etc.

Ford didn't learn by their mistakes, because the...

Crown Vics, Mercury Grand Marquis and Lincoln Town Cars have a similar problem, even tho the tank is mounted further forward.

High speed rear end collisions cause the tank and filler neck to do the same exact thing as occured to Pintos (and Bobcats).

The fix is the same: Longer filler neck, curved plastic shield.
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Most peeps today have either forgotten, or are too young to know about the exploding Pinto gas tank fiasco.

"Those that do not read history are doomed to repeat it."

Peeps are installing Mustang gas tanks on their Ford trucks, under the bed, just in front of the rear axle.

A Mustang tank was/is made the same way the Pinto tanks were made.

Upper/lower pieces welded together, forming a lip that protrudes from the tank all around its circumference by at least 3/4's of an inch.

What will happen if...?

 

Numberdummy, there are only 59 confirmed deaths and 139 severe burns from Pinto
accidents. Considering over three million sold with hundreds of millions of miles driven,
I don't think that's any more than any other car sold in large numbers for as long as Pinto's. I'm not apologizing for the dumb mistakes the engineers made (I think Iaccoca has blood on his hands for this), but the only reason they were sensationalized was because of the lawsuits. The wagons did not have the problem. And also, it was the GOVERMENT who decided how much a human life was worth. Of course, Ford shouldn't have took those figures and run with them.