Neck injuries caused by rear-end collisions have become a major problem in traffic safety over the last two decades, however, surprisingly little effort has been made so far to improve car seat and head rest design. Several studies have shown, that whiplash injuries can be reduced by minimizing the gap between head and head restraint during the first phase of a rear-end impact. On the other hand, the requests for comfort from the car passengers limit the reduction of this distance. Various publications show that generally neither drivers nor passengers are aware of the necessity to adjust current head rests to their head position. The conclusion is, the head rest should either be large enough to protect all occupants or should be automatically adjusted to protect all occupant sizes. This study shows a comparison of different active head restraint concepts, which guarantee a reduction of the distance between head and head rest during a rear-end collision. In addition the size of the head rest is enlarged. Different concepts were validated by sled tests using Hybrid-III Dummies equipped with the newly developed TRID-neck. Also volunteer tests were performed to prove the effectiveness of the new concepts. (A)
Samenvatting