THE INJURIES OF OCCUPANTS RESTRAINED BY A SEAT BELT ARE MAINLY AFFECTED BY THE VEHICLE CRASH CHARACTERISTICS AND SEAT BELT EFFECTIVENESS. MATCHING BOTH PERFORMANCES IS ESSENTIAL IN ATTAINING OCCUPANT'S SAFETY COMBINING REASONABLE WEIGHT AND COST. HITHERTO THE EFFICIENCY OF OCCUPANT'S ENERGY DISPERSION HAS BEEN EVALUATED IN TERMS OF THE RIDE-DOWN CONCEPT, A RATIO OF ENERGY ABSORBED BY THE VEHICLE TO THE OCCUPANT'S INITIAL KINETIC ENERGY. THIS LONG ESTABLISHED IDEA, HOWEVER, HAS A CERTAIN LIMIT FOR FURTHER ANALYSIS. IN THIS PAPER, A NEW METHOD OF ASSESSING THE RELATIVE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE VEHICLE STRUCTURE AND SEAT BELT SYSTEM IS PROPOSED TO PERMIT AN OVERALL BALANCED APPROACH. THE RIDE-DOWN EFFICIENCY IS BROKEN DOWN INTO VEHICLE STRUCTURE EFFICIENCY AND RESTRAINT SYSTEM EFFICIENCY. THE FORMER IS DETERMINED AS RELATIVE RIDE-DOWN EFFICIENCY WHEN THE SIMULATED VEHICLE WITH A STANDARD RESTRAINT SYSTEM IS SUBJECTED TO COLLISION. FOR THE COVERING ABSTRACT OF THE CONFERENCE SEE IRRD 802816.
Samenvatting