Crush tests were conducted with specially designed body forms into the side interior door of VW Rabbits previously crashed in side impact studies. An acceleration-type sled buck was built with an "interior door" mounted to mimic the interior stiffness determined from the crush tests. The sled was dynamically tested with a Haversine sled pulse similar to the door crash pulse, and was validated by reproducing the crash environment of a car-to-car collision. Validation criteria included acceleration-time and velocity-time curves of the interior door, kinematics of the Pt. 572 surrogate, and accelerations on the surrogate. Using the sled and a new side impact dummy, numerous energy-absorbing materials were tested as interior door padding. The following six types of padding gave the best performance in terms of AIS (Abbreviated Injury Scale) B parameter (acceleration of the left upper rib): Ensolite ABC, Fiberglas H3BC, Rubatex 2VS and R-310-V, GTREM, APR, and Durafoam C222A. The AIS values ranged from 3.2 to 3.5 (VW Rabbit traveling at 15 mph and impacted in the door area at 30 mph by an intermediate size vehicle at an impact angle 60 degrees from the forward longitudinal axis). The padding types ranked highest in upper spine 3 msec. clip acceleration tests were Durafoam C222A, Fiberglas H3BC, Ensolite AAC, APR, Rubatex R-310-V, and GTREM. The spinal accelerations ranged from 40 to 45 g's.
Abstract