Physical tests were performed with a bicycle and a dummy in a controlled laboratoryenvironment to reproduce cyclist accidents. The kinematics of 13 sled tests were used toidentify the cyclist head impact location, understand the interaction between the cyclistand bicycle and to validate a mathematical model.The finite element software code LS-DYNA was used to simulate 70 cyclist andpedestrian accidents with motor vehicles with four different vehicle shapes whichsupplemented the physical testing. The study has shown that when cyclists andpedestrians were struck by any of the vehicles their whole body kinematics can bedistinguished into two phases, initially a rotation followed by a sliding action. The SportsUtility Vehicle (SUV) vehicle produced more of a rotation action rather than sliding,whereas the other vehicles produced a combination of the two.The current pedestrian legislation does not cover all head impact locations for cyclistsand therefore needs to be extended to encompass the windscreen and A-Pillar regions ofthe vehicles. The wrap around distance (WAD) for all the vehicles, apart from the SUV,should be extended to encompass a larger region. For the SUV the current WAD region isadequate in protecting cyclists and pedestrians and does not need to change. Thepredicted head impactor angle for cyclists is 40 degrees which is lower than the currentlegislative value of 65 degrees and the predicted pedestrian head impact angle is higher ata value of 80 degrees for the MPV, SM and LFC. For the SUV the proposed impactorangle increased to 100 degrees for cyclists and pedestrians.This research has demonstrated significant differences in terms of input variables andoutcomes between cyclist and pedestrian accidents involving vehicles. It has usedmathematical models to obtain injury data from a human mathematical model andphysical testing to replicate real world cyclist accident scenarios. Recommendations havebeen proposed for future legislative testing techniques for cyclists, based on existingpedestrian legislation. These recommendations to alter legislation will improve vehicledesign and make future vehicles more cyclist-friendly.
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