EVALUATION OF VEHICLE COMPATIBILITY IN VARIOUS FRONTAL IMPACT CONFIGURATIONS

摘要: Light truck vehicles (LTVs), sport utility (SUVs), and vans collectively make up a growing segment of the total automotive fleet sales, particularly in United States. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has identified this trend increased extent its research vehicle-to-vehicle compatibility. Additionally, vehicle compatibility concerns have also been emphasized by International Harmonization Research Activity (IHRA). Accordingly, with intention to further enhance road safety, area crash between cars LTVs different configurations is significant importance. This paper describes part ongoing at Ford Motor Company investigate effect SUV/LTV-to-Car crashes. Test results crashes involving various frontal impact were analyzed order develop test procedures requirements help assess Specifically, three SUV-to-Car assessed present study: full overlap collinear impact, 50% offset 30-degree oblique impact. In each tests, both target bullet contained Hybrid III 50th percentile instrumented dummy (HIII50) for driver 5th (HIII05) passenger. Analysis tests yielded following results: (1) Structural occupant responses used quantify mass, stiffness, geometry, (2) A robust repeatable procedure was proposed, (3) Preliminary indicated that geometric incompatibility dominating factor studied design characteristics.