Citation

Somasundaram K, Kalra A, Sherman D, Begeman P, Yang KH, Cavanaugh JM. J. Biomech. Eng. 2017; 139(12): ePub.

Affiliation

Wayne State University, Department of Biomedical Engineering, 818 W Hancock Avenue, Detroit, MI-48201.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, American Society of Mechanical Engineers)

DOI

10.1115/1.4037591

PMID

28813547

Abstract

Anthropometric test devices (ATDs) such as Hybrid III dummy have been widely used in automotive crash tests to evaluate the risks of injury at different body regions. In recent years, researchers have started using automotive ATDs to study the high-speed vertical loading response caused by underbelly blast (UBB) impacts. This study analyzed the Hybrid III dummy responses to short-duration large magnitude vertical acceleration in a laboratory setup. Two unique test conditions were investigated using a horizontal sled system to simulate the UBB loading conditions. The biomechanical response in terms of the pelvis acceleration, chest acceleration, lumbar spine force, head accelerations and neck forces were measured. Subsequently, a series of finite element analyses (FEA) were performed to simulate the physical tests. The correlation between the Hybrid III test and numerical model was evaluated using the CORA version 3.6.1. The score for WSU FE model was 0.878 and 0.790 for loading condition 1 and 2, respectively in which 1.0 indicated a perfect correlation between the experiment and simulation response. With repetitive vertical impacts, the Hybrid III dummy pelvis showed a significant increase in the peak acceleration accompanied by rupture of the pelvis foam and flesh. The revised WSU Hybrid III model indicated high stress concentrations at the same location, providing a possible explanation for the material failure in actual Hybrid III tests.

Language: en