Response of safety belt webbing used for formula student race car in a frontal collision

Abstract

A particularly important element for ensuring the passive safety of a vehicle is the seat belt. In automotive engineering, the study of this subassembly is given special attention, because it plays a key role among the multiple safety systems, active and passive, that currently equip a vehicle. The paper studies several ways in which belt webbing can be damaged during use and how these defects can influence the behavior of the webbing. For this purpose, using the Finite Element Method (FEM) based on a mechanical model that considers the vehicle-driver-seat belt assembly, the forces that appear in the seat belt in the event of a frontal collision are determined. Experimental determinations carried out in the laboratory by the authors provide the mechanical properties modified following the failures. By introducing these mechanical properties into the developed model, it will be determined how the safety belt webbing responds in the event of a collision with a wall. A comparison is made between the behavior of the “new state” belt and one with defects in order to estimate the damage that can be caused by the appearance of the defects considered in the work.