Analysis and evaluation of an anti-shock seat with a multi-stage non-linear suspension for a tactical vehicle under a blast load

Abstract

Landmines and improvised explosive devices are serious threats to wheeled tactical vehicles. An anti-shock seat plays a key role in improving the anti-blast performance with respect to the safety of the occupants of the wheeled tactical vehicle, and the elastic and damping characteristics of the seat suspension are critical. A lumped-parameter model of the occupant–seat unit is set up and validated by vertical shock dynamics simulation. The responses of the occupant–seat system to the blast load are predicted for a seat suspension with initial linear elastic and damping characteristics, and the effects of the changes in the elastic and damping parameters of the suspension are studied. To achieve the compromise between the impact safety and the vibrational comfort of the occupant, the multi-stage non-linear elastic and damping characteristics of the seat suspension are investigated. Parametric optimization of the three-stage non-linear characteristics is conducted, and the results show a reduction in the peak acceleration of the pelvis by 11.7%. The correlation between the minimum response of the occupant and the minimum seat suspension stroke is revealed through multi-objective optimization.

Keywords

Anti-shock seat non-linear elastic and damping characteristics landmine improvised explosive device blast load numerical simulation optimization

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Alem

Srawm

. Evaluation of an energy absorbing truck seat for increased protection from landmine blasts. USAARL Report 96-06, United States Army Aeromedical Research Laboratory, Fort Rucker, AL, USA, 1996.

Tabiei

Nilakantan

. Axial crushing of tubes as an energy dissipating mechanism for the reduction of acceleration induced injuries from mine blasts underneath infantry vehicle. Int J Impact Engng 2009; 36: 729–736.

Zong

Lam

. Biodynamic response of shipboard sitting subject to ship shock motion. J Biomech 2002; 35: 35–43.

McAndrew

. Shock isolation parameters based on a damped harmonic oscillator model for mine blast protected seating. Report, United States Army Research Laboratory, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Adelphi, MD, USA, 2007.

ISO 5982:2001. Mechanical vibration and shock – range of idealized value to characterize seated-body biodynamic response under vertical vibration. Geneva: International Organization for Standardization, 2001.

Liu

X-X

. A nonlinear model of unrestrained human body to characterize seating shipboard personnel (in Chinese). J Appl Biomech 1994; 9(1): 34–40.

Wan

. An investigation into linear and nonlinear optimal seat suspension designs. Dissertation AAI9912735, Marquette University, Milwaukee, WI, USA, 1998.

Liang

C-C

Chiang

C-F

. A study on biodynamic models of seated human subjects exposed to vertical vibration. Int J Ind Ergonomics 2006; 36: 869–890.

Reed

Carroll

Rothe

. Armored crew seat drop test program. USAAVSCOM Technical Report 70-8, United States Army Aviation Systems Command, St Louis, MO, USA, 1966.

10.

Z-H

Dong

Y-P

. Numerical analysis of shock response characteristics of military vehicle and occupant under blast load and application. Technical Report, Department of Automotive Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, People’s Republic of China, 2011.

11.

Himmelblau

. Applied nonlinear programming. McGraw-Hill: New York, 1972.

12.

Poles

. The simplex method. Technical Report 2003-005, ESTECO, Trieste, Italy, 2003.