Abstract
Energy absorption during vehicle collision is one of the most challenging problems in the field of automotive safety. Here a new energy absorption device based on a completely new principle is designed and tested on real collisions. Such device is based on the transformation of the kinetic energy of the vehicle into kinetic energy of a high speed liquid jet (Patent WO 97/17554 or PCT/EP96/04847 filed by Joint Research Centre, inventors C. Albertini and M. Mogilevsky), which allows to overcome the limitations of the classical absorber based on plastic deformation like peaks on the deceleration and poor absorption in collisions against oblique obstacles. JRC has supported the testing of research prototypes at Lavrentyev Institute of Hydrodynamics in Novosibirsk and is now supporting LABEIN for the design of an industrial version of the new crash energy absorber. Three complementary approaches were used during the design process: Analytical derivation of the equations governing the phenomena, coupled fluid-structure simulations and tests. The design procedures will be completely described and finally the effectiveness of the LJCEA (Liquid Jet Crash Energy Absorber) will be demonstrated by means of crash tests under European and international standards.