• 한국자동차공학회논문집
• /
• 제11권6호
• /
• pp.108-117
• /
• 2003

Development of advanced restraint system challenges both restraint and automobile manufacturers to come up with proper airbag design to reduce occupant out-of-position related injury. The important component of the advanced restraint system is the multi stage inflator. The multi stage inflator can independently control two or more airbag inflation stages to maximize occupant protection. The objective of this research is to develop relationship between airbag inflation characteristics, the occupant positions and the airbag design variables. The tests are conducted using five kinds of inflators, two kinds of airbag cushion folding methods and two kinds of tear lines. In the case of inflator, the out-of-position tests are performed with a traditional inflator, a depowered inflator and a dual stage inflator. And the efficiency and injury mechanism are evaluated by analyzing the injury pulses and values. Using this relationship, airbag design guideline is established for airbag aggressivity thresholds and the risk of injury is identified according to occupant positions.

• 한국자동차공학회논문집
• /
• 제11권2호
• /
• pp.148-156
• /
• 2003

Many car manufacturers have frequently adopted an aggressive inflator and a lower threshold speed for airbag deployment in order to meet an injury requirement for unbolted occupant at high speed crash test. Consequently, today's occupant safety restraint system has a weakness due to an airbag induced injury at low speed crash event. This paper proposes a new crash algorithm to improve the weakness by suppressing airbag deployment at low speed crash event in case of belted condition. The proposed algorithm consists of two major blocks-crash severity algorithm and deployment logic block. The first block decides crash severity with two levels by means of velocity and crash energy calculation from acceleration signal. The second block implemented by simple AND/OR logic combines the crash severity level and seat belt status information to generate firing commands for airbag and belt pretensioner. Furthermore, it can be extended to adopt additional sensor information from passenger presence detection sensor and safing sensor. A simulation using real crash data for a 1,800cc passenger vehicle has been conducted to verify the performance of proposed algorithm.