IT seems so impersonal to address one of the greatest innovators of safety in our cars as 95 per cent male or five per cent female - even hybrid III seems a little strange.

But despite being an integral part of in-car safety developments, the crash test dummies are used extensively in ensuring we are as safe as possible in modern motor cars, remain anonymous anthropomorphic test devices.

Designed and developed by First Technology, a group which includes Hampshire-based City Technology, the dummies are worth around £100,000, when full of electronic wizardry.

The dummies are even enshrined in American law with their weights and dimensions based on figures of American people. The very first dummies date back almost 50 years and were based on the average figures of American servicemen.

The anonymous dummies sit around in test workshops, waiting to be called into action and feed essential data back to the experts who interpret a dazzling array of numbers and graphs.

Car manufacturers around the world use exactly the same dummies, manufactured to exactly the same standards and calibrated to exactly the same levels to ensure that uniform tests and results are used.

The adult dummies represent different size men and women with average weights for each sex, plus dummies which represent extremes from a very light woman to a very heavy man.

This is where five per cent female comes in - just five per cent of women would be smaller and the man, 95 per cent, means that just five per cent would be larger and heavier.

There are also special dummies to accurately portray children from babies to toddlers and older children.

The science is so precise and detailed that at Ford's Dunton plant the test engineers concentrate purely on front impact studies - an area which has been transformed in recent years with the advent of airbags and the latest seatbelt systems.

Around 25 dummies are based at the research and engineering centre and naturally they need a little help getting around, so they use a fleet of wheelchairs to move from the workshop into the test area where they are hoisted into position.

Every detail has to be as close as possible to a real crash situation - even down to the clothing worn by the dummies. They have to wear cotton clothes to ensure the same friction levels as a real person in a crash and even the men's shoes are a specified design.

The crash test dummies have been in the headlines in recent years as stars in the video footage of new cars being crash tested - but they play an integral role very early on in the development of new cars.

Even though Ford is among the leaders in simulating impacts on computer, every new vehicle still has to undergo a complex cycle of real-life crash tests - with the dummies on board.

Throughout the development of a car the dummies are kept busy - although they are given a rebuild after about ten tests - those mock crashes can play havoc with your joints and limbs.

The dummies are being constantly developed and evolve as car design moves forward and to compensate for the kind of injuries that drivers and passengers sustain. As roads have changed, cars become faster and motoring become more commonplace so the kinds of injuries have also changed.

In the past, it was head and chest injuries which killed people, so designers were tasked with coming up with safety devices to counteract the problem. Airbags and sophisticated seat belts have played a major role in this aspect of car safety.

But this has led to neck and spine injuries becoming the priority and more recently, the lower leg has been taking the brunt of impacts.

It is the nature of injuries from front impacts which Dunton is particularly interested in, and already folding pedals are helping ease the incidence of lower leg injuries.

The new Mondeo has a collapsible pedal assembly. In a frontal crash, the driver is often pressing hard on the brake pedal in an attempt to stop the vehicle but at the moment of impact - when the brakes can no longer help - the pedals are designed to collapse. This relieves pressure on the foot, ankle and leg and in addition, energy absorbing under carpet is foam padded to reduce the injury potential still further.

The changes in seat belt legislation have also played a major part in road safety with back seat passengers a major cause of death to driver and front seat passengers in the past - as they were thrown forward in frontal impacts.

With the dummies ready for action and wired-up for the job in hand, they are placed in the mock-up car - designed to replicate a particular model to the finest detail.

Around 250 tests a year are carried out at Dunton with a sled replicating the acceleration and deceleration of crash tests - a cheaper option than using a new car every time a test is staged and a system which has saved countless lives over the years.