With the increasing ratio of light trucks to automobiles in the U.S. fleet over the last decade, vehicle compatibility has come into question. A number of tests and performance criteria are under development worldwide to quantify a vehicle's structural design in frontal impacts. These tests and criteria record the force exerted by a vehicle structure onto a high-resolution rigid wall to determine the height from ground of the average force as well as its gradient across the load cells. This paper presents NHTSA's computer simulation research of these vehicle performance tests as they pertain to vehicle compatibility. A number of frontal impact scenarios of a light truck impacting various load cell walls with and without a deformable face are simulated. Changes are made to the vehicle's structure, and the effects to the evaluation criteria are presented. For the covering abstract see ITRD E825082.
Samenvatting