Innovative passive and active countermeasures for near side crash safety

Abstract

This research presents six simultaneous innovative occupant near side lateral impact protection concepts, including a dynamic door, a high-volume side airbag, a large external airbag that covers doors, sill and B-pillar of the struck vehicle and other concepts for increasing the distance between the occupant and the door panel (active armrest, inflatable door beam and moving seat). All systems are based on pre-crash detection of the impact and are activated as soon as 80 ms before the impact. This paper details the task of integrating these systems into a vehicle using finite element models, sled tests and full scale crash tests.