Side Door Collision
Reinforcement of the Side (Doors) of a Car
Side impact car crashes (also called "T-bone accidents" or "broadside collisions") tend to have a more devastating effect on the human body than all other types of car accidents, according to researchers at Monash University Accident Research Centre in Melbourne. Side impact car accidents kill between 8,000 and 10,000 people each year, more than rear-end and head-on collisions combined. Even at speeds as low as 30 km/h, side impact car crashes routinely cause serious injuries to the occupants of the struck car. While modern automotive have many safety features to protect drivers and passengers from front and rear accidents, such as airbags, seatbelts, and bumpers, side impact car crashes leave occupants relatively unprotected. Some automotive feature side curtain airbags, but most vehicles offer no protection from side impact crashes besides the car door.
With the ongoing development of lighter, fuel- efficient cars that are subjected to ever increasing safety requirements, the automotive engineer must strive to meet all the structural requirements of what has typically been thought of as conflicting criteria. Enabling a vehicle to be safe and fuel-efficient often demands the structural engineer to compromise between weight savings and crashworthiness. These demands, combined with the recent sharp increase in the amount of Light Truck Vehicles (LTV’s) on North American roadways, has brought the matter of vehicle incompatibility and the crashworthiness of smaller vehicles to the attention of the automotive consumer.
Fig 1. Sideway Interior Reinforcement
JOALTO MODULAR DOOR TECHNOLOGY
Due to the lack of standardized safety installations to protect occupants, the types of possible injuries suffered in a side impact car crash can vary greatly, ranging between head injuries, ear injuries (most often caused by broken glass and airbags), neck injuries, back injuries, rib injuries, shoulder and arm injuries, or hip and leg injuries.
To address several automotive safety issues, Joalto Design Inc. has developed a structurally modular door technology with several attributes. The patented modular door technology, combines light weight, reduced cost, structural stiffness, durability and packaging modularity in a set of space frame door modules. The developed structural door modules act as Primary Structures, to be assembled as truly modular entities. Each primary structure is packaging modular in the sense that it acts as a carrier for the door latch, window regulator and hinges. The most important attribute of the developed modular door technology, however, is the side impact safety performance.
Fig 2. Sideway Impact (Collision) Aftermath
Fig 3: Joalto Assembled Modular Door
The Joalto door technology has been developed based on the Cruciform Side Intrusion Beam, which incorporates the side intrusion beam and the primary door structure as one element Fig 3.
To demonstrate the crash performance of the Joalto door systems, a set of side impact tests were designed to reflect the current fleet of vehicles on North American roads. The developed Joalto side impact tests resembled a collision from an average sport utility vehicle into a midsize sedan door. The goal of these tests was to simulate side impact with a sport utility vehicle in terms of bumper height. In order to test the door structure in a side impact, without actually testing the crashworthiness of the entire vehicle, a test apparatus was developed where midsize sedan doors, seats and seatbelts can be interchanged.
The crash apparatus was developed to allow reuse of the attachments such as the hinge face (A- pillar) and the rocker panel. These parts were made of reinforced steel plate in order to be able to sustain impact from multiple tests. A fabricated B-pillar that replicated the bending moment of the production piece was used in place of an actual pillar. The B- pillar was made to be deformable and replaceable so that it would deform like a production model and not be too rigid to allow deformation of the door.
Conclusion: At a glance
As a conclusion, side door impact beam is one of the structures that is responsible to absorb kinetic energy and reduce door intrusion to the occupants when a vehicle is involved in side impact collision. Accordingly, it should be sufficient to withstand the impact loading. Hence, the component needs to have high strength to prevent the passenger compartment from being compromised and it also needs to be ductile to prevent the intrusion to the passenger’s compartment. To that end, extensive research on the
combination of types, materials, and joints of side door impact beam should be conducted properly by engineers to avoid injuries and fatalities to the occupants. This will reduce the statistics of fatality in side impact collision.
Reference:
[1]https://www.researchgate.net/publication/326342527_Passenger_Car’s_Side_Door_Impact_Beam_A_Review
[2] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13638-018-1123-4