An Analysis of the MVMA Sponsored Full Scale Side impact Tests 892431

An analysis of the MVMA-sponsored full scale side impact tests of modified Ford LTDs indicated that the high, nonhuman-like inertia of the dummy chest had profound influence over the dummy responses. In particular, energy absorbing padding was always crushed by the inertial force when the door impacted the dummy. The heavy axial pistons and dampers in the dummy chest, and the variable arm positions further exacerbated poor repeatibility of the chest deflection responses. Although TTI (d), an acceleration based injury criterion, discriminated the presence of padding and was repeatable, it exaggerated the potential benefits of padding in injury mitigation. Analysis of the data also indicated that the structural enhancement performed on the LTDs did not reduce the door intrusion velocity consistently in the tests. Consequently, dummy responses were not influenced by the structural enhancement.