Driving simulators are increasingly used in chassis development. An application example is the subjective assessment of the controllability of the vehicle in the event of damage. As a result, an axle concept can be developed with regard to the chain of occurring damages or risk assessments of potential axle damage can be carried ou in a cost-saving, reproducible manner and without endangering the driver. A central question in the application of driving simulators is the validity of the results. In this work, the subjective evaluations and physiological stress indicators in the real vehicle and in the driving simulator are compared. For this purpose, three real vehicles are equipped with differently deformed tie rods on the rear axle and in parallel a validated real-time capable full vehicle model is used. A slalom, a double lane change and a cornering manoevre are completed by 20 semi-professional test drivers. A comparison of the subjective evaluations shows that for tie rod deformations up to 15 mm absolute validity is achieved. For the 25 mm deformed tie rod, there are statistically significant differences, which can be explained by the physical limits of the full vehicle model. There are no statistically significant differences in the physiological quantities, which indicates a comparable stress level in the vehicle and in the driving simulator.