Topic 1 Part 4

Environmental and Safety

Requirement and Customer
Demand

Safety Requirement- Crash

Crumple zones are structural areas in the front and
sometimes rear of a vehicle that are designed to absorb
energy upon impact in a predictable way.
Crash test results from the National Highway Traffic
Safety Administration's New Car Assessment Program
(NCAP) indicate that occupant injury and fatality risk can
be reduced by designing vehicles with softer front end
structures resulting in larger "maximum crush," provided
there is no intrusion.
Newton's first law states that an object in motion will stay
in motion with the same speed and in the same direction
unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.

Passengers will continue to move forward at the same speed until

they come in contact with a part of the automobile or another human
being, causing injury.

Even after a human body comes to a stop in an accident, its internal

organs continue to move, slamming against each other because of
the impact, often causing serious injury or death.

Newton's second law of motion, force = mass x acceleration,

conveys that as the time it takes for an automobile to come to rest or
change direction is increased, the force experienced by the
automobile (and its occupants) is decreased.

Conversely too, if the time to stop is shorter, the force experienced

is greater. Crumple zones add time to the crash by absorbing
energy.

Crumple zones are designed to absorb the energy from the

impact during an accident by controlled deformation. This
energy is much higher than is commonly recognized.
A 2000kg car traveling at 60 km/h (16.7 m/s), before crashing
into a massive concrete wall, is subject to the same impact
force as a front down drop from a height of 14.2m crashing on
to a massive concrete surface.
Increasing that speed by 50% to 90 km/h (25 m/s) compares
to a fall from 32m - an increase of 125%.
This is because the stored kinetic energy (E) is given by E =
(1/2) mass speed squared. It increases as the square of the
impact velocity

Crumple zones allow the front of the vehicle to crush like an

accordion, absorbing some of the impact of the collision and
giving some off in the form of heat and sound. The front of the
vehicle effectively acts as a cushion that slows the time it takes for
the vehicle to come to a complete stop, applying less force on
passengers, which could help save their lives.

Euro NCAP Frontal Impact

There exists legislation in the USA and Europe covering and limiting
the consequences of frontal and side impacts by means of laboratory
tests.

Both test methods are in principle quite similar, the conditions differ
somewhat, however. The European front impact test calls for a
deformable barrier colliding with the front of a car at a speed of 56
km/h (35 mph) with an overlap of only 40~ whereas the FMVSS 208
calls for a full frontal impact with an undeformable barrier at a speed
of 30 mph (48.3 km/h).

Frontal Impact
Head/Neck
Upper and lower torso

It was determined that restraining the occupants in their seats

would prevent this second impact: people hitting the inside of
the car after the car hit an obstacle. The frontal impact dummies
were developed to test these restraints--seat belts and airbags.

Side Impact
head,
neck,
and
thorax injuries

Side impacts can produce head, neck, and thorax injuries due to sudden
acceleration and interior contact with a collapsed interior. Frontal impact
restraints-seat belts and frontal airbags are not sufficient to protect the
occupant from these injury pathways. Use of the side impact dummies has
aided in the development of strengthened side doors and side curtain airbags
to protect the head and upper body.

Side Impact
head,
neck,
and
thorax injuries

Rear impact dummies have been used to test for the effects of low speed
impacts to the rear of the vehicle. These impacts can cause serious injury to
the neck especially in the soft tissue. Tests with these dummies can be used
to determine the effectiveness of headrests on the seats in preventing excess
motion of the head and neck.

 Increasingly, vehicle design specifications

include greater demands for improved
behaviour in side impact accidents. The
problems are as follows: deformation paths are too short
the front structures of the penetrating vehicles
are too rigid
side structures are too soft
direct contact of the impacting body with the
occupant is possible.

 A number of steps have been made to improve

this situation:
vehicle transverse reinforcement members with floor
structure
the use of higher strength steels
interlocking the door with the sill
door reinforcement members; already mentioned
above are the EA PP or EA-PUR foam crash pads,
steel reinforcements and honeycomb structures in the
doors
many cars are now being equipped with side airbags,
coming out of the side of the seats or door panels to
protect the head.

Air Bags

Air bags and airbag system design have evolved significantly over
the many years since their introduction to motor vehicles.

This process will inevitably continue and there are likely to be more
changes in system design and deployment methods covering all
aspects of the system from sensors to inflators and diffuser tubes as
air bag usage extends through first the inside and then potentially
the outside of the motor vehicle.

However, despite various considerations of material options for the

cushion material, nylon 6,6 remains the material of choice.

This is not surprising, as experience shows that where energyabsorbing fabrics are required, the special properties of nylon 6,6
continue to make the material a logical choice.

The foundation of an airbag module system is the inflator.

Pyrotechnic inflation technology has changed over the past few

years from reliance on sodium azide to the use of organic
propellants in order to minimise environmental impact of the
propellant and to increase efficiency.

For frontal airbag systems the need for better protection of out-ofposition occupants has led to the development of multi-stage
devices that have the potential to provide large or small volumes of
gas as deemed necessary by the sensor system.

In some respects these changes have increased the demands on

the airbag cushion as they have led to higher inflation temperatures
and in some cases greater risk of hot particulate ejection with the
potential to lead to melting of the cushion fabric.

Older airbag formulations contained mixtures of oxidizers and sodium

azide and other agents including igniters and accelerants. An
electronic controller detonates this mixture during an automobile
crash:
2 NaN3 2Na + 3 N2

The same reaction occurs upon heating the salt to approximately 300
C. The sodium that is formed is a potential hazard itself and, in
automobile airbags, it is converted by reaction with other ingredients,
such as potassium nitrate and silica. In the latter case, innocuous
sodium silicates are generated.

Sodium azide is also used in airplane escape chutes.

With the exception of a small number of old designs that are

being phased out of production, all airbag cushions
manufactured world-wide are constructed with fabric made from
nylon 6,6 yarn.

The key initial drivers were performance and cost/benefit. As

one can imagine, the key function of the airbag cushion is to
absorb the impact. Nylon 6,6 has the most superior capability in
energy absorption. The balance between the strength and
elongation gives it unmatched suitability for airbag cushion
materials.

Although nylon 6,6 and polyester have similar melting points, the
large difference in specific heat capacity causes the amount of
energy required to melt polyester to be about 30% less than that
required to melt nylon 6,6.

Hence in any inflation event that uses a pyrotechnic or pyrotechniccontaining inflator, cushions made from polyester yarn are far more
susceptible to burn or melt through in the body of the cushion or at
the seam.

Figure shows this difference pictorially; two fabrics with identical

construction have been subject to contact with the same body at 400
oC for 2 seconds; despite the higher mass of the polyester fabric the
onset of melting is clear.

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 The second advantage of nylon 6,6 is its lower density.

For fabrics made with yarns of identical diameter and in
the same construction, polyester fabric is 20% heavier
than the fabric made from nylon 6,6.
Lower mass has key advantages reducing the mass of
the cushion lowers the kinetic energy of impact on the
occupant in out-of-position situations thus enhancing
safety, while allowing the overall weight of the vehicle to
be reduced.
Of course, this also has the effect of increasing the cost
of material in the polyester fabric relative to nylon 6,6.

The difference in density between the two polymers leads to polyester yarns
usually being of higher denier or decitex (weight per unit length) than nylon 6,6,
to generate the same filament diameter. This results in reduced fabric coverage
as illustrated in Figure.

Using polyester yarn, the cushion fabric is more open for gas permeation. This
reduces thermal protection for the vehicle occupants, and makes it more difficult
for the cushion designer to control the bag deployment dynamics.

In addition, since seam strength is strongly dependent on cover factor, seam

performance is negatively impacted. This is particularly important since seam
leakage of hot gas is one of the principal concerns of the engineer, and the
potential for an increase in leakage combined with a reduction in thermal
resistance is critical.

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Environmental Issue
North America- USA

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The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 currently

regulates environment standards for North American automotive
industry.

The act increased Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAF)

standards from 27.5 mpg to 35 mpg (14.8 km/l) by model year 2020
for OEMs combined passenger car and light truck fleets.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is responsible for

calculating the fuel efficiency for each OEMs passenger and lightduty truck fleets for manufacturing year.

If the fleet does not meet the CAPE standard, the penalty is U.S.
%5.50 per tenth of a mile per gallon for each tenth under the
standard amount multiplied by the total volume of vehicles in the
fleet manufactured in the manufacturing.

OEMs can ear CAPE credits when the fuel efficiency level of a fleet
exceeds the standard in a given MY.

European Union

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 The Commission has set a CO2 emission limit on vehicle

manufacturers for new cars registered in the EU in order
to achieve an average community-wide objection of 120
g/CO2/km from 2012 onwards.
Penalties from 2012 onwards will be imposed on a
sliding scale. Manufacturers that exceed their target by
more than 3 grams will pay 95 Euros per excess gram
per vehicle.

Japanese

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 Current legislation in Japan does not entail direct

penalties or fines towards OEMs that do not meet
government regulated emission standards.
However, under Japans mandatory vehicle inspective
program, any vehicle that does not comply with
government standards Is not permitted to be driven on
public rods.
There is an indirect sales impact on new cars that do not
meet government emission standards: they will be
ineligible for government subsidies, effectively making
their car prices less attractive.

Ford Taurus

Steel Bolster

Plastic Bolster

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Chevrolet TrailBlazer

Steel Bolster

Plastic Bolster

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