Fifteen-passenger vans are in widespread use for the transportation of college sports teams, van pools, church outings, and other similar groups. There have been a number of widely publicised single vehicle crashes that have involved fifteen-passenger vans transporting college sports teams in the last year. All but one of these crashes have involved rollover of the fifteen-passenger vans. These crashes have raised the question as to whether fifteen-passenger vans, especially loaded fifteen-passenger vans, are unusually susceptible to rollover. Fifteen-passenger vans differ from most light truck vehicles in that they have a large payload capacity and the occupants sit fairly high up in the vehicle. Therefore, when loaded the vehicle may have a much worse rollover propensity than when unloaded. To examine this issue, a brief study has been performed. This study is composed of three parts: a review of crash data to look at the record of fifteen-passenger vans; measurement of the Static Stability Factors (SSF) of a fifteen-passenger van, a seven-passenger van, and a minivan; and a simulation analysis of the handling characteristics of an unloaded and loaded fifteen-passenger van. (Author/publisher)
Samenvatting