Crash testing is a natural part of a car’s life story. In order to sell these cars to regular humans, it has to be safe for humans in an accident—but there’s always something especially painful about watching prototype hypercars from a boutique manufacturer go through routine crash testing, knowing exactly how expensive each little piece of broken machine is. And that’s what we’re going to experience today with the Glickenhaus 004S.

Larry Kosilla of has put together a great video that takes an in-depth look at each component of the car prior to the crash test so that we can understand more about the detailing on the 004S’ unique surfaces.

And, of course, there’s the actual crash itself.

As with pretty much all manufacturers, Glickenhaus has put the car through simulated tests to see how it fares in a variety of different circumstances, which is great for development. If you have a problem in the simulation phase, you can make the necessary changes before you even manufacture a part. These are high-cost cars to begin with, so the last thing you want to do is spend more money developing one car after another just for the purposes of breaking them.

Of course, there’s nothing that compares to the real deal. As great as simulations are, they can still miss things that may not be obvious until a car hits the wall for the first time. Which is why manufacturers like Glickenhaus and still send their multi-million dollar machines flying into the wall.

As a business that makes and sells car care products, Ammo NYC’s role in this project has been a really interesting one. Kosilla has been working directly with Glickenhaus to develop unique options for buyers, since the car’s pre-impregnated carbon fiber body panels aren’t exactly the industry norm. And that’s how we’ve gotten this behind-the-scenes look at both the product development and crash test portions of the 004S.