The Influence of Occupant Characteristics, Seat Positioning, and Pre-Crash Maneuvers on Front Passenger Safety Performance

Abstract Crash avoidance vehicle maneuvers are known to influence occupant posture and kinematics which consequently may influence injury risks in the event of a crash. In this work, a generic buck vehicle finite element (FE) model was developed which included the vehicle interior and the front passenger airbag (PAB). Seat position and occupant characteristics including anthropometry, sex, and age were varied in a design of experiments. Two pre-crash maneuvers representing (1) a generic 1 g braking and (2) turning-and-braking scenarios were simulated. Rigid-body human models with active joints (GHBMCsi-pre models) obtained by morphing a 50th male model to selected anthropometries were used in pre-crash simulations. The kinematics data of belted GHBMCsi-pre models at the end of the pre-crash phase were transferred using a developed switch algorithm to the corresponding morphed Global Human Body Model Consortium (GHBMC) occupant simplified (OS) models to predict occupant injury risks. Finally, an FMVSS-208 pulse was applied to simulate the in-crash phase. During both pre-crash maneuvers, the occupant's head and thorax moved forward toward the dashboard. Therefore, the head and thorax contacted the PAB earlier, leading to lower head accelerations when the pre-crash phase was considered. Overall, it was concluded that pre-crash braking decreased the severity of injury sustained by the passenger. Seat track position and seat recline angle showed the highest influence on the head injury criterion (HIC). The brain injury criterion (BrIC) and neck injury criterion (Nij) were most sensitive to pre-crash maneuver type, seat recline angle, and occupant size.