Analysis of One-way Clutch Mechanism of Motorized Retractors and Evaluation of Motor Driving Scenarios 2007-01-3745

A retractor is the major component of a seatbelt system that restraints passengers by locking the movement of webbing. Recently, in order to increase the effectiveness of seatbelt systems, motorized retractors that remove slack and correct passenger posture just before airbag expansion when collision is predicted are widely used. Key component of motorized retractors is the one-way clutch that engages and disengages the winding action of webbing according to the direction of motor revolution. Analytical investigation of action of the one-way clutch mechanism has been carried out to figure out conditions for one-way locking, and to study the effect of various kinematic and dynamic design variables of one-way clutch. Using combination of ADAMS and LifeMOD softwares, dynamic simulation of operation of motorized retractors including Hybrid-III dummy model has been carried out to evaluate the performance of the motorized retractors in various crash scenarios.