Development of a Head Injury Criteria-Compliant Aircraft Seat by Design of Experiments

Giuseppe Lamanna,Francesco Caputo,Amalia Vanacore,Bonaventura Vitolo,Salvatore Cicatiello,Michele Guida,Francesco Marulo

doi:10.3390/aerospace6090095

Giuseppe Lamanna, Francesco Caputo + Show 5 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace6090095

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Abstract

This paper deals with the redesign of an aircraft passenger seat, placed at the first seat row, which was not compliant with Federal Aviation Regulations FAR 25.562 “Emergency landing dynamic conditions” regulation (due to a high value for the Head Injury Criterion (HIC)) and related guidelines. Starting from an accurate analysis of some results obtained via an experimental seat sled test, a numerical procedure was developed in order to improve the passenger safety with respect to head injury. Specifically, the proposed numerical procedure, using the advantages of a Finite Element (FE) model and a Design of Experiment (DoE) approach for simulation modeling, was aimed at identifying a new design solution to avoid the impact between the passenger’s head and the bulkhead. The redesign of the passenger seat was validated against an experimental test carried out at Geven S.p.A. Company by demonstrating, consequently, the compliance of the modified seat-belt system with the regulations.

Highlights

Crashworthiness requirements drive the design of most automotive and aerospace structural components in order to improve their passive safety performance and, to protect occupants against injuries and death during a crash event
The aim of this paper is to define a numerical procedure to improve the design of an aircraft passenger seat, considering passive safety as the main goal
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Summary

Introduction

Crashworthiness requirements drive the design of most automotive and aerospace structural components in order to improve their passive safety performance and, to protect occupants against injuries and death during a crash event. Many research studies involving experimental tests and numerical studies are carried out to verify that the proposed design solutions respect crashworthiness requirements and to predict the injury level for occupants in case of an accident [1,2]. It is necessary to evaluate the entity of the damage in the presence of a head impact. For this purpose, the experimental test for component certification can take advantage of the high level of technology introduced in the current Anthropometric Test

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