The CHILD (CHild Injury Led Design, 2002 2006) project was a European Commission Fifth Framework project with the aim of improving child occupant protection in road accidents. TRL's participation in the project was funded jointly by the European Commission (EC) and the Department for Transport (DfT). This report was prepared for the DfT to summarise the EC CHILD project. TRL's contribution to the project was the main focus of the report, but some comment is also included on areas of the project that TRL was not involved in directly. Additionally, the report includes related research undertaken on behalf of the DfT outside the EC project. There were several strands of activity within the CHILD project, but one of the fundamental aims was to develop of injury risk curves for the Q Series dummy. Full scale accident reconstruction was the main technique used in the project to provide the data from which to develop the risk curves. The injuries children received in real accidents were compared with the dummy measurements in corresponding reconstructions. The project made a valuable contribution to the field of child occupant protection in cars. For example, a great deal was learned about the performance of child restraints in severe collisions and about child injury mechanisms in these collisions. Additionally, the project increased the knowledge about the performance of the Q Series dummy and its potential as a tool to predict injury in children. However, although the EC project met its objectives in terms of the number of accidents collected and the number of full scale reconstructions carried out, there were too few data to generate meaningful injury risk curves for the Q Series dummy in a number of important body regions. In addition, a different version of the Q Series was used in a number of the accident reconstructions. Further work will be necessary, therefore, either to complete these risk curves or to develop performance limits for the Q Series measurements by some other method. (Author/publisher)
Samenvatting