2013 International Conference on Quality, Reliability, Risk, Maintenance, and Safety Engineering (QR2MSE)

Research of Front Seat Design Parameters on Rear Seat Passenger Safety

Ruhai Ge, Zibo Lu, Fei Zhao
School of Automobile and Traffic Engineering Jiangsu University Zhenjiang, China 360686685@qq.com
AbstractTo study the influence of front seat parameters on rear seat passengers safety when front crash happens, this paper uses MADYMO software to establish a rear seat passenger constraint model, which includes car bodies, safety belts and a 5% dummy for impact simulation. Using this model, the simulation values are close to the results of the vehicle impact test. The influence of design parameters including the front seat headrest and backrest parameters on passenger HIC, T3MS, femur force is analyzed by this model. The relationship between front seat parameters and passenger injury values is obtained, further the measure that reducing passenger injury values is proposed. Keywords-front impact; rear seat passenger; headrest; backrest; simulation

II.

MODEL BUILDING

Using MADYMO software to establish a rear seat passenger constraint model, which includes car bodies, safety belts and a 5% dummy. A. Car Body Model A car body model mainly includes floor, front seat, rear seat and seat headrest. Floor is a rigid plane model. Seat (including cushion, seat backrest) and seat headrest are finite element modeling. Cushion and slide rail adopts translational joint, connects slide rail with the reference space by bracket joint, connects cushion with backrest by revolute joint, and connects backrest with headrest by revolute joint. B. Dummy Model According to C-NCAP2012, the dummy model adopts Hybrid III fifth percentile female dummy. A dummy is arranged on the left rear seat [5, 6]. Using the INITIAL.JOINT.POS command to specify the initial state for dummy and the dynamic balance method to accurately positioning the dummy, this dummy is only under gravity, locked the limbs joints, when output balanced, and then imported back into model, at last release previously locking joints. C. Seat Belt Model The seat belt model is a 3-point one, in which the part contacting with the dummy adopts finite element model, and other parts adopt multi-body model. The dynamic balance method is used to determine the safety belt position. The procedure is: firstly, determine the security position that is located in front of the dummy and locks all dummy joints; secondly, unload acceleration information of the dummy body and then do the preliminary simulation, making the seat belt fit with the dummy, output the nodes location file, finally import the file into the original model. The belt initial position is thus determined. The rear passenger frontal crash simulation model is shown in Fig. 1.

I.

INTRODUCTION

In China, the utilization rate of car rear seat is high, and the seats are often used by seniors, children or noble identity persons [1]. However, they are not under effective protection. The main reason is that compared with front seat, rear seat is lack of configuration. The usage rate of the rear seat belt is low and the belt is prone to fail. The aims of the research on rear seat passengers passive safety include rear seat belt usage, rear seat belt stiffness, retractor locking characteristics, cushion angle of rear seat, and so on. The research on front seat is mainly for driver and passenger safety protection [2]. It is lack of research on front seats for the rear seat passenger protection. In this paper, MADYMO software is used to construct a rear seat passenger constraint model and then, based on this model, the rear passengers damage mechanism is studied [3]. Once front crash happens, the head of passengers seating on the rear seats would consequently collide with the headrest and backrest of the front seat and the body of the passengers on the rear seats is easy to collide with the front seat backrest [4]. In order to protect rear seat passenger during the front crash, this paper mainly analyzes the relationship between front seat parameters and passenger injury values, and improves seat design.

978-1-4799-1014-4/13/$31.00 2013 IEEE

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result comparisons between the simulation model and the tests.

Figure 1. A rear passenger frontal crash simulation model.

D. Algorithm This model mainly had two acceleration models, one of which is the acceleration of gravity field, the other of which is the horizontal acceleration along X direction, which was the real vehicle collision reversed curve of acceleration measured B column. The horizontal acceleration along X direction is shown in Fig. 2.

Figure 4. Acceleration curves of chest obtained by the simulation and the test.

Figure 5. Acceleration curves of hip obtained by the simulation and the test.

TABLE I. COMPARISONS BETWEEN TEST RESULTS AND SIMULATION

RESULTS

Figure 2. The horizontal acceleration along X direction.

Injury Index Head Acceleration (ms-2) HIC36 Hip Acceleration (ms-2) 3MS(?)/(ms-2) Left Femur Force(N) Right Femur Force(N)

Test Resultt 709 866 584 668 1688 1452

Simulation Result 618 902 537 631 1712 1627

Deviation /% 12.8 4.2 8.0 5.6 1.4 12

III.

VALIDATION OF SIMULATION MODEL

The validation of the above simulation model followed the principle of "bottom-up", i.e. from lower limbs, hip, chest to head, to verify the effective ness of this model. Force and acceleration signals satisfy the basic characteristics of "starting moment, pulse width, shape, peak, peak time [7]. Figs. 3, 4, and 5 are acceleration curves of head, chest, and hip, respectively.

As shown in the above figures and the table, the deviations of the key indicator of the simulation model, the injury index, between the simulations and the tests below 15%. The simulation curve approximately matches the curve of the test. Therefore, MADYMO simulation model exactly simulates the process of the car collision and can be used as a basic model in further research. IV.
Figure 3. Acceleration curves of head obtained by the simulation and the test.

STUDY ON HEADREST PARMETERS

In these figures, the real lines represent the results obtained by the simulation model, and the dashed lines represents the results in the tests. Table. I also shows the

Automotive headrest is an important part of car safety, but automotive headrest research mainly focuses on the prevention of the driver whiplash injury [8]. The rear seat generally lacks protective equipment, for example, an airbag. When front crash happens, the rear seat passenger would push forward because of inertia. As a result, the rear passengers head would collide with the headrest and the

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backrest of the front seat of a car, especially in a small car. This section mainly analyzes the front headrest parameters, including the headrest horizontal distance, head height and head stiffness, and formulate the best headrest parameter. Fig. 6 and Fig. 7 show the injury values of the rear seat passenger under different front headrest horizontal distances and different headrest heights, respectively.

too soft [9], and then passengers head directly collides with the front headrest skeleton. Such design is not good for rear passenger head safety. V. STUDY ON BACKREST PARAMETERS By observing and analyzing the process of rear passengers in frontal crash, it can be found that the human bodies, i.e. thighs, knees, legs and other parts have secondary collisions with the front backrest. This section studies front backrest angle, backrest stiffness and distance of backrest influence rear seat passenger head injury values and other parts injury values. The premise is that the front seat headrest parameter is unchanged. Table. III to Table. V show injury values of the rear seat passenger when setting different backrest parameters, i.e. its angle, stiffness, and distance, respectively. From Table. III to Table. V, when the backrest Angle is set around 21o, head injury values are smaller than the injury values when setting other angles. Continuing increasing the backrest angle will increase the passenger HIC, T3MS, femur force. Increasing backrest stiffness and backrest distance will increase passenger head and femur injury values. Without influencing the comfortable feeling of rear seat passengers, it needs to appropriately reduce backrest stiffness and backrest distance.
TABLE III. REAR SEAT PASSENGER INJURY VALUES WHEN SETTING BACKREST ANGLES

Figure 6. The injury values of the rear sear passengers under different head horizontal distances.

Figure 7. The injury values of the rear seat passengers under different headrest heights.

Injury Index HIC T3MS (ms-2) Left Femur Force (N) Right Femur Force (N)

19 831 749 1698 2571

Backrest Angle/(o) 21 23 25 824 833 838 764 1701 2572 772 2406 2572 782 2412 2575

27 928 788 2534 2575

According to Fig. 6 and Fig. 7, the front headrest position change mainly affects rear passenger injury values/ Therefore, selecting appropriate parameters, including the headrest horizontal distance and the height of the front seat can reduce the rear passengers HTC (? full spelling), and at the same time decrease the passengers head injury values to a certain range. However, the front headrest position change has little effect on the thoracic injury values. Table. II shows the head injury values of the rear seat passenger, including thoracic injury values and femur forces under different headrest stiffness.
TABLE II. REAR SEAT PASSENGER INJURY VALUES WHEN SETTING DIFFERENT HEADREST STIFFNESS Injury Index HIC T3MS (ms-2) Left Femur Force(N) Right Femur Force(N) 60% 838 786 1682 1473 Headrest Stiffness 80% 100% 120% 842 846 850 786 1685 1473 786 1685 1475 786 1682 1472 140% 853 786 1680 1473

TABLE IV. REAR SEAT PASSENGER INJURY VALUES WHEN SETTING DIFFERENT BACKREST STIFFNESS Injury Index HIC T3MS (ms-2) Left Femur Force(N) Right Femur Force(N) 60% 807 773 2358 2566 Backrest Stiffness 80% 100% 120% 809 838 861 784 2357 2567 785 2358 2567 781 2358 2566 140% 882 782 2358 2567

TABLE V. REAR SEAT PASSENGER INJURY VALUES WHEN SETTING DIFFERERNT BACKREST DISTANCES Injury Index HIC T3MS (ms-2) Left Femur Force (N) Right Femur Force(N) 0.41 817 785 1698 2566 Backrest Distance /m 0.43 0.45 0.47 903 862 903 792 1698 2567 785 1740 2567 785 2115 2566 0.49 928 785 2869 2567

According to Table. II, reducing the front seat headrest stiffness can effectively protect the rear seat passengers head. Of course, reducing headrest stiffness causes material

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VI.

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES
[1] Q. Zhan, Save VIP. Beijing: World auto, 2010. [2] J. Cai, W. G. Qiao, and Y. J. Zhang, Vehicle front impact restraint system model establish and the analysis of passenger protection, SAIC Motor, vol. 17, no. 2, pp.57-59, 2010. [3] Y. Y. Tau, Finite element simulation of the EEVC offset deformable barrier, Society of Automotive Engineers, vol. 18, no. 2, pp. 157160, 2001. [4] Z. D. Sun and Y. G. Liu, Research of rear seat passenger injury values when front crash happens, Automobile Engineering, vol. 20, no. 3, pp. 18-21, 2011. [5] B. Walner, N. Martindale, and J. Green, The Crash Analysis of a Passenger Vehicle Under Differing Frontal Crash Conditions. New York: Society of Automotive Engineers, 1993. [6] C-NCAP, Tianjin: China automotive technology and research center, 2012. [7] R. H. Ge, D. Xu, and Z. Y. Wang, Research of seat design parameters on passenger injury values when front crash happens, Vehicle and Power Technology, vol. 5, no. 2, pp. 117-120, 2010. [8] S. A., The safety of headrest can never be ignored, Auto and Safety, vol. 2, no. 9, pp.48-49, 2006. [9] B. Zhao, P. Q. Fan and T. Tao, The analysis of active headrest energy absorption, Machinery Design and Manufacture, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 115-116, 2010.

This paper uses MADYMO software to establish a rear seat passenger constraint model, which includes car bodies, safety belts and a 5% dummy for impact simulation. Compared the simulation results with the test results, the correctness of the model was verified. By using the model, the influence of front headrest parameters and backrest parameters on rear seat passengers injury values were studied. The conclusions are drawn as follows: (1) Selecting appropriate front seat headrest horizontal distance can reduce the rear passenger HTC. (2) Within the scope of the experiencial settings, reducing the front seat headrest stiffness can effectively protect the rear passengers head. (3) Choosing appropriate backrest angle can reduce the rear passengers head, chest and femur injury values. (4) When not influencing the rear seat passengers comfortable feelings, appropriately reducing backrest stiffness and backrest distance can protect the rear seat passenger.

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