FIRST BAST PRESENTATION (FI-21-02): Seating positions of the H-III 5% dummy – Test series with the Reference Vehicle

OICA comments that the wording used in the presentation seems to mean that the airbag is aggressive. Consequently, OICA suggests to update this wording so that a reader does not think that having an airbag is worse.

- Discussion on the goal of regulation:
Pierre Castaing confirms that the goal of type approval and regulation is to address the majority of the accidentology and cover the majority of cases (barrier, dummies, speed). When type approving, the technical service has to choose in the range of cars the worst case for a test.

- Discussion on chest acceleration:
BAST (T.Adolph) suggests to add a chest acceleration criteria in addition to the chest deflection, in order to give an idea about the kinematics of the dummy during crash.
Japan (Tanaka San) adds that chest acceleration is not related to the injuries, but with dummy behavior and it might show side effects.

=>Japan will bring some data for the next IG meeting.

PDB (N.Praxl) explains that chest acceleration is not a good predictor as the serious injuries are coming from deformation and not from acceleration. Chest acceleration is not linked with the injuries (for instance, sports cars may induce very high chest acceleration on the driver without any injury). Need some facts to understand why the presentation concludes that thorax acceleration is an interesting criteria. The fact that the values on chest acceleration are high does not mean that this has an influence.
OICA (BMW, Wolfgang Ogorek Broll) recalls that Canada has removed this criteria completely in the last amendment of CMVSS 208.
Also US NCAP deleted this criteria.

=> OICA will come up with a presentation on this topic for the next IG meeting.

- Discussion seat adjustment:
BAST (T.Adolph) showed results where one test per seating position was performed. The proposal is to install a 5th passenger at 25% forward of the seat adjustment range, as it seems a more realistic and good average between mid position and full frontal.
OICA notices that the seating position does not have a major influence on the results shown. In other regulations, the seat adjustment is according to the manufacturer’s indication. Maybe we should use the same approach. If not, there might be a position where you cannot install a 5th (due to a combination of adjustment in X and height, as well as steering wheel adjustment).
NL (H.Ammerlaan) and Germany (R.Damm) recommend to check more vehicles before making a decision.

=> OICA will come back at the next IG meeting with more details.