• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.432-438
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• 2016

Whiplash injuries in low-speed rear-end collisions are the most common injuries and has been a social issue in insurance industry, such as excessive medical claim costs along with exaggerated injuries of victims and treatments from hospitals. According to the Korea Insurance Development Institute reports, the number of claims by rear-end collision was approximately 703,000, which accounts for 53.6 % of the total car-to-car collisions in 2014. Part of the neck injury claims in the Korea car insurance was approximately 28.3 %. Furthermore, approximately 98.4% of the injured persons in rear-end collisions sustained minor injuries under AIS2. In order to improve this situation as well as find out the severity of neck injuries from rear-end collision, the Korea Automobile Insurance Repair Research and Training Center conducted car-to-car rear-end crash tests that striking vehicles(SUV) collided into different sizes of struck-vehicles(small, middle, and large sedan) at the impact speeds of 8 km/h ~ 16 km/h. In order to analyze the whiplash injury, the BioRID-II was seated in each struck-vehicles, and the neck injury criteria(NIC), head contact time, maximum vehicle accelerations, and mean vehicle accelerations were calculated from values from the accelerations of the dummy and the struck-vehicles.

• International Journal of Automotive Technology
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.67-73
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• 2007

This study analyzes the interior noise that is generated during acceleration of a passenger car in terms of car body structure and panel contribution. According to the transfer method, interior noise is classified into structure-borne noise and air-borne noise. Structure-borne noise is generated when the engine's vibration energy, an excitation source, is transferred to the car body through the engine mount and the driving system and the panel of the car body vibrates. When structure-borne noise resonates in the acoustic cavity of the car interior, acute booming noise is generated. This study describes plans for improving the car body structure and the panel form through a cause analysis of frequency ranges where the sound pressure level of the rear seat relative to the front seat is high. To this end, an analysis of the correlation between body attachment stiffness and acoustic sensitivity as well as a panel sensitive component analysis were conducted through a structural sound field coupled analysis. Through this study, via research on improving the car body structure in terms of reducing rear seat noise, stable performance improvement and light weight design before the proto-car stage can be realized. Reduction of the development period and test car stage is also anticipated.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.29-34
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• 2005

141,841 car-to-car collision had occurred in 2003, and among the accidents 51,796 were rear-end impact. According to insurance company for loss or damage, more than $60\%$ of rear-end impact victims suffer neck injury. This means at least 31,000 neck injury victims have happened in 2003. More than $97\%$ of the neck injury victims have low severity injury than A.I.S 2. Head restraint, which is designed to limit rearward head movement and equipped on seat, can considerably protect neck from rear-end impact. In this paper we evaluated head restraint geometry and drivers' sitting position according to RCAR standard and carried out low speed volunteer crash test. The crash speed is 4km/h and N.I.C value is used to determine injury probability. Through these research results we can introduce the method to prevent neck injury at rear-end impact.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.67-75
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• 2011

A new energy absorbing mechanism for car seat was developed to reduce the neck injury in rear impacts. Energy absorbing principle is based on the shear-bolt behavior of thin-walled cast components subjected to static and dynamic loads. Results of shear bolt test using AM60 of Mg alloys showed robust behavior giving an approximately constant mean force during failure processes. Simply designed energy absorbing mechanism was assembled with the recliner between seat backs and seat rails. We have simulated the sled test of seat with dummy under the rear end impact using the finite element method. Results of simulation show that the new seat mechanism reduces thorax acceleration to a considerable extent, but it is not sufficient to mitigate neck injury indices e.g. neck shear force, neck tension force and NIC. With heightened headrest and narrowed backset, the energy absorbing mechanism resulted in good performance of protecting the neck injuries.

• Journal of Auto-vehicle Safety Association
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.5-10
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• 2012

Whiplash is the most frequent injury among occupants in low speed rear-end car collision. The aim of this paper is to analyze thecorrelation between influence parameters of head restraints and whiplash injury criteria.In this paper, DFSS (Design for Six Sigma) method is used for optimum design of head restrains. Four control factors of head restraints have selected by function matrix method. The effects of the control factors have been experimentally evaluated by using a sled pulse from 16km/h relative velocity which is suggested by KNCAP (Korean New Car Assessment Program). In order to reduce the noise factors of dynamic tests, whiplash tests were repeated twice. By using DFSS, the correlation between control factors and injury criteria has been comprehended.

• Composites Research
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.253-258
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• 2023

Although the development of transportation means has realized the right to mobility for the disabled who have difficulty in moving, it can be said that the improvement of the safety of passengers with disabilities that can occur in a car accident is lower than that of ordinary passenger seats. In particular, in the case of a rear-end collision that can occur suddenly, it is a reality that disabled passengers are vulnerable to head and neck injuries. Therefore, in this study, a multi-layer headrest foam that divides the headrest into three parts in the coronal plane was proposed to improve the head and neck injury index of disabled passengers in the vehicle in the event of a rear-end collision of a wheelchair transport vehicle. A range of stress scale factors was selected to give various compressive characteristics of the foam through low-speed rear-end collision analysis through a simple model, and GA optimization was performed by specifying the range as a parameter. Through the optimization result, the phase relationship between HIC and NIC was analyzed according to the compression characteristics of the layers. HIC responded most sensitively to the compression characteristics of the front layer and NIC responded to the compression characteristics of the mid layer, and the compression characteristics of the rear layer showed the lowest. A normal headrest and an optimized multi-layer headrest were placed in the validation model to analyze the low-speed rear-end collision sled test, and HIC and NIC were derived lower in the multi-layer headrest than in the general headrest. The compression behavior of the multi-layer headrest was also clearly shown, and it was verified that the multi-layer headrest was effective in improving the injury index of the head and neck compared to the general headrest.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.13 no.11
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• pp.4956-4962
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• 2012

Among the various parts of automobile, automotive seat is the most fundamental item that ride comfort can be evaluated as the direct contact part with human body. Automotive seat must have the sufficient rigidity and strength at the same time with ride comfort. In this study, cushion frame and back frame at car seat are modelled with 3D. There are structural simulation analyses about 3 kinds of tests on torsion strength, vertical load strength and back frame strength. In the analysis result, the initial total deformation and the permanent total deformation has the maximum values of 5.4821 mm and 0.02539mm respectively at the torsion strength test of cushion frame. Total deformations at front and rear end parts of cushion frame become the values of 2.1159mm and 0.0606mm respectively at the test of vertical load strength of cushion frame. In case of more than this load, the maximum value of total deformation also becomes 3.1739mm. The maximum value of total deformation becomes 0.18634mm at 3 kinds of the strength tests on back frame. By the study result of no excessive deformation and no fracture cushion frame and back frame at automotive seat, the sufficient rigidity and strength to guarantee the safety of passenger can be verified.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.61-69
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• 2020

This study examined the braking characteristics of a heavy haul freight train with P4a distribution valves applied to domestic high-speed freight trains. A freight train was composed of 50 cars, which is twice the normal operation. A braking test was performed to confirm the characteristics of the braking of a heavy haul. The brake cylinder pressures were measured for emergency and service braking on the 1st, 10th, 20th, 30th, and 50th cars. Because the brake signal is transmitted to the pressure through the braking tube connected to the end of the train, the rear vehicle is braking later than the vehicle ahead. Therefore, it is necessary to predict the brake pressures in all cars in a train to supplement the results of the limited tests and calculate the braking distance. The pressure in each car was determined using empirical models of linear interpolation, stepwise, and exponential models, which provided reliable information. The predictive results of the empirical models were compared with the measured results, and the exponential model was predicted relatively accurately. These results are expected to contribute to the safe operation of heavy haul freight trains and can be used to predict the braking distance and calculate the level of impact between vehicles during braking.