Integration of Commercial Pick Up Vehicle to Meet Pedestrian Safety Requirement 2015-26-0155

Globally, road traffic crashes kill about 1.24 million people each year. Pedestrians constitute 22% of all road deaths, and in some countries this is as high as 60%. The capacity to respond to pedestrian safety is an important component of efforts to prevent road traffic injuries. Pedestrian collisions, like other road traffic crashes, should not be accepted as inevitable because they are, in fact, both predictable and preventable. Examination of pedestrian injury distribution reveals that given an impact speed, the probability of fatal injuries is substantially greater when the striking vehicle is a pick-up rather than a passenger car. Given their utility areas, pickup vehicles require negotiating rough terrains and are therefore engineered with higher ground clearance and larger approach angle. The challenge is to optimize these design parameters and also style the vehicle for pedestrian safety while maintaining a low design cost at the same time.

This document presents methodology and a set of solutions to meet pedestrian impact safety for pickup vehicles as per the guidelines recommended by Regulation (EC) No 78/2009, of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 January, 2009. Pedestrian lower leg simulation is performed on LS DYNA with an Impactor propelled at a speed of 40Km/h towards the front end of the pickup vehicle. Head injury risk is assessed separately for adults and for children by identifying Head Impact Zones for both in CAD software CAVA CATIA. Head impact simulation is then performed in the relevant parts of the bonnet top area using LS DYNA software. The results thus obtained are used to optimize vehicle's front end to meet pedestrian safety requirements.