DEVELOPMENT OF VEHICLE SEAT BY EMBEDDING URETHANE WITHIN AIR CELL

摘要

This paper describes a new vehicle seat containing an air cell embedded with urethane. This air cell can be used to control mechanical properties such as spring constants and damping coefficients by varying the air pressure. When the air cell is retrofitted in a vehicle seat, it is essential for us to analyze its vibration characteristics, which is the aim of this study. Herein, after the air cell is retrofitted in a vehicle seat, its vibration characteristics are examined by performing excitation experiments using the prototype seat. From the results of this experiment, the resonance frequency of the human dummy (45.6 kg) was found to be 6.0 Hz when the pressure within the air cell was 2 kPa. However, the resonance frequency of the human dummy was found to be 5.3 Hz when the pressure within the air cell was 10 kPa. These results indicate that the vibration characteristics of the prototype seat can be varied by controlling the pressure within the air cell.