Abstract
Multibody dynamics methodology is an important tool for vehicle accident simulations. In fact, crash test set-ups are often expensive and generally, accident reconstruction reports are not detailed enough to identify the driver behavior after the impact. In the field of Powered Two Wheelers (PTW), the multibody methodology can be very useful to analyze the accident scenario and to understand the rider behavior during the impact. This research presents the simulation results of a crash scenario reproduced by using the multibody software LMS Virtual.Lab Motion and the methodology followed during the research.
In the presented paper, the motorcycle and the rider models are defined: the former is composed of 7 rigid bodies and 12 DOF and the latter consists of 24 rigid bodies and 23 joints. A graphic interface, explicitly developed for this purpose, allows the user to easily create a motorcycle model by choosing among several front and rear suspensions and different tire models. By analyzing motorcycle accident statistics and reports, two different crash scenarios have been studied as the most representative: front impact and lateral impact while just the latter one was simulated. The main aim of this work is to compute the Initial Condition for more detailed FE simulation, paying close attention to the head collision. These inputs will be used to further improve the simulation of the helmet crash analysis by introducing different pre-crash factors. This research is being developed within MYMOSA project (MRTN-CT-2006-035965), a research network financed by the Sixth framework Program (Marie Curie Actions) of the European Union. The ambition of this project is to provide a significant contribution to the reduction of motorcycle fatalities and injuries on European roads.
Keywords: multibody simulation, motorcycle crash, MB dummy, MB neck, impact helmet modelling.