The importance of seatbelts

PURPOSE: The job of the seatbelt is to hold the passenger in place so the passenger
is almost part of the car which prevents the passenger from flying forward as the
car stops abruptly in the case of a collision.

Real Life Situation

When a car stops suddenly due to a collision with another object such as another
car, a tree, pole, guardrail, etc. the car's acceleration decreases very quickly in a
short period of time. This is called deceleration. Newton's Law of Inertia explains
how this happens.
LAW OF INERTIA: An object in motion continues in motion with the same speed and
direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.

As the car collides with another object, the other object provides
theforce which changes the speed and direction. The car stops going in the
direction it was going in, and in some cases bounces back depending how
hard of a force hits it or how much momentum the car had. Also, the speed
decelerates quickly due to the impact.

When all this happens the passenger is not being acted upon by a force to
slow them down. This part is where the seatbelt comes into play.

As the person continues in their same direction and speed ( forward and the
same speed that the car was going) the seatbelt catches them, holding them
back from flying through the air.

The alternative is to not wear a seatbelt, but a force will still have to act on
the person in order to slow them down. This force will come from the
dashboard or windshied as the person crashes into it causing a lot of damage
to themselves.

A seatbelt has two parts. The first part rests over the passengers pelvis and
the second part rests over the shoulder and across the chest. When the car
stops abruptly the seatbelt applies the stopping force across a large section
of the body so the damage is reduced.

Seatbelts are made of flexible materials which have more give then a
dashboard or windshield would have.

The Use of the Airbag

The purpose of an airbag is to help the passenger in the car reduce their speed
in collision without getting injured.
Objects in a car have mass, speed and direction. If the object, such as a person, is
not secured in the car they will continue moving in the same direction (forward) with
the same speed (the speed the car was going) when the car abruptly stops until a
force acts on them.
Every object has momentum. Momentum is the product of a passengers
mass and velocity ( speed with a direction). In order to stop the passenger's
momentum they have to be acted on by a force. In some situations the passenger
hits into the dashboard or windshield which acts as a force stopping them but
injuring them at the same time.
An airbag provides a force over time. This is known as impulse. The more time the
force has to act on the passenger to slow them down, the less damage caused to
the passenger.

There is a restricted amount of time that the airbag has to act between when the
car hits the other object and the passenger hits the steering wheel.

About 15 to 20 milliseconds after the collision occur the crash sensors decide
whether or not the collision is serious enough to inflate the airbag (usually 6 10 km/h).

If the crash sensors decide to inflate the airbag it will be deflated at about 25
milliseconds after the crash.

It takes about 20 milliseconds to inflate the airbag for the person to land into.

Around 60 milliseconds the person has made contact with the airbag and the
airbag now starts to deflate.

The passenger continues to be acted on by the airbag as it is in the deflation

process which takes about 35 to 40 milliseconds.

It is still necessary to wear a seatbelt although all automobiles must be equipped

with an airbag because of a few reasons:
1) The crash sensors do not signal for the airbag to inflate unless the vehicle is
moving at least 6 km/h. Damage can still occur to the passenger if the collision is of
a slower speed. This is where the seatbelt plays an important role.
2) The airbag located in the steering wheel does not help the passenger in a
collision where another car hits them side on.
3) When the car the passenger is in is backing up and collides the its rear end with
another object the airbag does not help.
With today's technology other airbags are being introduced in addition to the
steering wheel airbag and the passenger airbag. Such airbags that are being
introduced are side airbags and head airbags.

The use of Headrests in a Collision

Headrests are found in every type of car to prevent neck injuries that occur during
an automobile collision. The way the neck becomes injuried is due to physics.
- In some collisions when the car slams into another object or the brakes are
slammed on very quickly the body stays in the same position but the head is thrown
either backwards or forwards. Once the head is thrown one way it naturally is
thrown the other way because the neck muscles and vertebrae force it that way. As
the neck is thrown in the second direction it goes at a higher speed then when it
was thrown in the first direction due to Newton's Laws.
Real Life Situation
Picture a person that is standing still getting pushed forward by another person.
What are the effects? As the person pushing goes towards the second person they
are going at a certain speed while the second person is not moving. As the person
pushes the second person they seem to remain in almost the same position, taking
only a step forward but their head goes backward and then forward. They may
complain about their neck being sore for a while.
Now picture that a car is going at a certain speed (which would be a lot faster then
was the person was going at above) and it hits into a parked car with a person in it.
The person in the second car would have neck injuries due to the impact if their
headrest was not in place right. The person in the first car may also experience
neck injuries because they are travelling at a certain speed and then quickly stop
due to the collision, sending their neck forward with the same results as the person
in the second car.

what is a crumple zone, where is a crumple zone located and the science behind crumple zone.

What is a Crumple Zone?

The crumple zone (also called crush space) is a structural feature used in automobiles to absorb the energy of
impact. This way, when someone crashes with your car, the force of impact is much higher than the realized
force. The reason is due to the design of crumple zone, which generally uses methods of controlled
deformation in the area between outer shell and inner body.

Where is a Crumple Zone located?

A more usual crumple zone is located in the front part of the vehicle, to absorb much severe head-on collision,
which results in maximum number of accidents in a car. But much safer cars now-a-days are employing
crumple zones in the frontal three quarters of the car, to reduce side impacts too, where the occupants are
more prone for a fatal damage. According to a British Motor Insurance Repair Research Centre study, 65% of
the accidents faces front impacts, 25% rear impacts, 5% left side, and 5% right side.

Why we need a Crumple Zone?

Why do we need a Crumple Zone is a basic question of physics that we have been discussing in all of our
previous series discussions. It's all due to the Interia or momentum! Inertia or momentum is that force which
acts when a vehicle and all its contents, including passengers and luggage are travelling at speed, but are
stopped immediately (which in this case is the accident). Now in the event of a sudden deceleration, the
occupants will continue moving forward at their previous speed due to inertia, and will hit the dashboard or
vehicle interiors at a force equivalent to many times their normal weight due to gravity. This is where Crumple
Zone comes and slows down the collision and to absorb energy to reduce the difference in speeds between the
vehicle and its occupants.
Now one may argue that seatbelt and airbags do the same thing, slow down the impact of the occupants. This
may be right to an extent, but the final impact after a passenger's body hits the car interior, airbag or seat belts
will deploy only to hurt the internal organs like ribcage or skull due to high inertia. Other ways are skeletal
damage and blood loss, because of torn blood vessels, or damage caused by sharp fractured bone to organs
and/or blood vessels.

What Crumple Zone does is, reduce the overall inertia of the body as a whole. This combined technology of
crumple zone seatbelt airbags padded interiorare designed to work together as a system to reduce
the force of the impact on the outside of the passenger(s)'s body and the final impact of organs inside the body.

How does Crumple Zone function?

As we have told earlier, crumple zone is nothing but a space between the outer shell and the inner shell of the
car, which absorbs the majority of impact force when a vehicle faces accident, saving the occupants' lives. To
achieve so, the body designers sacrifice the outer body shell by weakening it and hence making it lightweight.
On the contrary, the inner shell is toughened and made strong by deploying various strengthening materials like
composites and steel.
But why make the outer shell weak and inner strong? Various studies have proven that the impact energy that
reaches into a safety cell is spread over more widely and hence reduces deformation. But what is a safety cell?
Safety cell is nothing but the cabin of the car, which is converted into a safety cell by increasing the rigidity of

the cabin. So now designers know that it is safe to build a strong safety cell, but a string safety cell means more
materials, resulting in increased weight. Now in a vehicle, as much as safety is essential, so is the performance
and an increased weight lowers the performance many folds. So to reduce the weight of the car, exterior body
is sacrificed by building low weight and relatively weak exterior shell.

Materials used for building Crumple Zone

A typical Crumple Zone is built up of many materials, combinedly known as the impact attenuator. The majorly
used materials to form an impact attenuator is a high tensile steel, composites, carbon fibre and aluminium.
Some of the most advanced racing cars also use a high grade energy absorbing foam that forms an impact
attenuator to dissipate the crash energy using a much smaller volume and lower weight than road car crumple
zones. Volvo is credited for being the pioneer in setting up proper Crumple Zones in cars and it also introduced
the first, side crumple zone with the SIPS (Side Impact Protection System) in the early 1990s.

Is Crumple Zone really safe?

There is a huge misconception among many that the Crumple zone is designed in such a way that the weak
outside shell could lead to reduced safety of the occupants, resulting in crushing of the occupants. In reality,
though, the safety cell helps saving the occupants life more effectively than any other system. Many crash tests
have proven that the modern vehicles provide far more superior protection as compared to the older cars with
no crumple zones.
Also, it has been proven that a vehicle with a crumple zone when collides with a vehicle without crumple zone,
benefits both the involved cars, as the impact force is taken from the crumple zone of the former car. This case
is usually an improvement over the cases when both the cars colliding doesn't have any crumple zones.
You can read our previous articles under the safety series here!