%0 Journal Article
%T Estimation of energy-absorption space for pedestrian leg protection of car front-end structures
%J International journal of vehicle design
%D 2012
%A Huang, Jun
%A Xia, Yong
%A Nie, Bingbing
%A Zhou, Qing
%V 60
%N 1/2
%P 20-38
%X For either the pedestrian's head or lower limb protection, Energy-Absorption (EA) space needs to be estimated for designing pedestrian-friendly front-end structures in the early stage of new vehicle development. However, existing methods in literature so far to estimate EA space for pedestrian lower-limb protection look over-simplified. This paper proposes a more reasonable equation to estimate EA space based on a Finite Element (FE) analysis. The energy-related parameters in the EA estimate equation were statistically determined with a parametric study. The detailed process of the legform-to-bumper impact test was also analysed, which may provide more insights into engineering design.    Keywords: pedestrian protection; legform impactor; energy absorption space; front-end design; energy transformation; free-free beams; vehicle front-end structures; leg protection; vehicle safety; vehicle design; finite element analysis; FEA; impact testing; bumper impact.<p />
%G en
%I Inderscience Publishers
%@ 0143-3369
%U http://dx.doi.org/10.1504/IJVD.2012.049156