Study of the Sled Test Simulation for 40 % Offset Deformable Barrier Crash Test

Abstract

Sled test simulation has been one of key tools in developing vehicle restraint systems and been widely used in every OEMs. However, for frontal crashes, traditional sled test facility can only simulate full frontal crash test effectively. It can not simulate frontal 40 % offset crash tests where the vehicle rotates and pinches during the crash. This limitation has become a bottleneck for the restraints developments when the new safety star rating standard—2012 version of the C-NCAP requires both 50 km/h full frontal test and 64 km/h frontal 40 % offset test to be conducted. To develop restraints system by crashing full vehicles clearly is not timely and economically viable. Therefore, it is important to study how to modify the traditional sled test facility to be able to simulate the frontal offset vehicle crashes. This paper uses CAE MADYMO model to successfully find a representative rotation angle in order to guide the sled test set up. The model consists of driver side 50 % male dummy, airbag, seatbelt with pretensioner and load limiter, and a crushable steering column. First, the MADYMO model is constructed and correlated with 64 km/h vehicle test injury numbers. Then, the MADYMO model is rotated along Z axis. A series of angles and the corresponding vehicle pulses are input into the model and the dummy performances including the injury numbers and the movements are analyzed. The author finally finds a representative angle and the vehicle pulse, which can be used for the sled test set up for accurately simulating the 64 km/h 40 % offset frontal vehicle crash test. With the application of this methodology, the traditional sled test facility can be used for both full frontal vehicle crash simulation and offset frontal vehicle crash simulation as well.KeywordsMADYMOCAEODBSled testVehicle crash safety