Abstract
Severe braking is one of the major causes of damage to the vehicle occupant. In this article, the effect of seat belt on injury risk of the passenger during severe braking is investigated and optimized seat belt parameters based on different injury criteria is determined. A nonlinear bond graph model representing the dynamic behaviors of the vehicle, occupant and seat belt is developed. Considering the developed bond graph model, the state differential equations of the system are derived. Solving the governing equation, effect of initial velocities and braking torques of the vehicle and stiffness and damping of the seat belt on the system responses is obtained. Head injury criterion, neck injury criterion, and thorax injury criterion are used to evaluate the effects of seat belt parameters on injury risk of the vehicle passenger. According to these criteria and weighted injury criterion developed in this article, the seat belt optimized stiffness and damping are determined to minimize the occupant injury risk. The optimization results show that minimum injury for all criteria indexes is happened in the same stiffness and damping amount has crucial role on decreasing the risk of injury.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.