Improving automotive crashworthiness using advanced high strength steels

摘要

Crashworthiness is a measure to ensure that a vehicle is able to absorb energy of impact in a crash and be safer for occupants. Generally, the experimental methods of crashworthiness are time consuming and expensive. This paper presents the simulations of crash tests based on the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards that simulate a full frontal impact, side-impact and roof crush for a Dodge Neon vehicle to assess the structural crashworthiness. The approach in the first step is to select best materials according to mechanical properties, environment and cost considerations by EDUPACK material selector. In the second step, a non-linear finite-element analysis is carried out using RADIOSS. Structural deformations, internal energies, contact forces, intrusions and accelerations are extracted from simulation results to evaluate full vehicle structure crashworthiness. It is shown that Advanced High Strength Steel (AHSS) materials, due to their excellent properties, have considerable potential for assessing a vehicle's crash safety performance.