Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx

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Analysis of frontal car crash characteristics using ANSYS

Sono Bhardawaj a, Rakesh Chandmal Sharma a,⇑, Sunil Kumar Sharma b,⇑
a
Mechanical Engineering Department, Maharishi Markandeshwar (Deemed to be University), Mullana 133207, Ambala, India
b
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amity School of Engg. and Tech., Amity University, Uttar Pradesh, Noida 201303, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This article presents the finite element simulations for the crash characteristics and the energy absorp-
Received 17 April 2019 tion of thin longitudinal members of square and rectangle cross-sections using steel and aluminum as
Received in revised form 2 December 2019 materials. Specific energy absorption and Peak forces experienced are the main variables considered in
Accepted 27 December 2019
the analysis. Square shape provides a 16% increase in specific energy absorption and 15% rise in peak
Available online xxxx
force experienced as compared to the rectangular shape, while use of aluminum reduces the weight
by 63% consequently there is a decrease in both specific energy absorption by 24% and peak force
Keywords:
experienced by the longitudinal member by 64%.
ANSYS
AUTODYN
Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
LS-DYNA Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 2nd International Conference on
Finite Element Modelling Computational and Experimental Methods in Mechanical Engineering
Crash characteristics

1. Introduction mization of the member. Analyses of front frame rails including

An increasing public awareness of safety issues and stronger
legislative requirements have increased the pressure on vehicle
manufacturers to improve their vehicles’ crashworthiness. The
crashworthiness of a vehicle depends on the structure’s ability to
absorb maximum kinetic energy while maintaining the integrity
of the occupant’s compartment. To ensure the vehicle’s structural
integrity and its ability to absorb crash energy with minimal
diminution of survivable space, it is important to study the crash
behaviour of the front-end structure to reduce peak forces and
improve its energy absorption capacity. Understanding the crash-
ing behaviour of the front-end structure is extremely important
because it affects the overall profile of the crash pulse, which is
directly related to passenger injury [1–10]. The frontal safety per-
formance of vehicles is mainly controlled by the collapse behaviour
of the longitudinal frame members in the front-end structure.
Therefore, the longitudinal frame members need to be optimized
to perform more progressively and efficiently when accidents hap-
pen under any conditions [11–16].
There are two main routes to optimize the crash performance of
the longitudinal frame member: the introduction of advanced
materials with better mechanical properties and geometric opti-
⇑ Corresponding authors at: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amity
School of Engg. and Tech., Amity University, Uttar Pradesh, Noida 201303, India.
E-mail addresses: rcsharmaiitr@gmail.com (R.C. Sharma), sunilsharmaiitr@g-
mail.com (S.K. Sharma).
calculations of their energy-absorbing characteristics have been
extensively conducted in the collapse behaviour of S-shaped
beams. Reinforcement of the cross-section has been shown to
increase the specific energy absorption of the S-shaped longitudi-
nal beam during impact. An experimental study was carried out
by Kim and Wierzbicki [4]. In their research, they addressed the
design aspect of a front side rail structure of an automobile body
and investigated several internal stiffeners to strengthen the longi-
tudinal tubes. They concluded that a structural reinforcement
increases the total energy absorption. More recent studies have
shown that substitutions with better material are generally more
effective than structural modification in improving automobile
crashworthiness and in producing lighter weight [17–20].
Aluminum alloys have been put forward to replace low-
strength steel structural components within automobiles. The rea-
son for using these alloys is that the design and manufacturing sec-
tors are now trying to reduce the weight of automobiles while
maintaining or improving the energy absorption [8]. Cross-
sectional dimensions and material properties are the main consid-
erations used to determine the stiffness, strength and energy
absorption of box-type structures. The applied loads to hydro-
aluminum foam-filled S-shaped tubes. From the deformation pat-
tern of the S-shaped tube, they concluded that ultra-light metallic
foam-filling is a good way to strengthen S-frame members.
Metallic foam-filler cannot only provide the advantage of
weight efficiency, but also increases the efficiency of the S-tube
due to the contact between the skin and the foam filler. Although

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2019.12.358
2214-7853/Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 2nd International Conference on Computational and Experimental Methods in Mechanical Engineering

Please cite this article as: S. Bhardawaj, R. C. Sharma and S. K. Sharma, Analysis of frontal car crash characteristics using ANSYS, Materials Today: Proceed-
ings, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2019.12.358
2 S. Bhardawaj et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx

this study was positive on the use of the foam-filled S-tube, Table 2
another study discovered that the addition of aluminum form- SEA and peak force of longitudinal members with square and rectangle cross-sections.

filled structures increased the energy absorption but also led to Profile Material Weight (g) SEA (KJ/kg) Peak Force (KN)
an increase in peak forces [21–39]. Therefore, the study concluded Square Steel 88.1 0.694 104
that even though aluminum foam-fill is an efficient alternative Aluminum 31.9 0.521 36.9
energy absorber, it does not increase the specific energy absorption Rectangle Steel 88.5 0.598 90.5
of the structure due to the increased mass [5]. In addition to alu- Aluminum 31.8 0.467 30.8

minum, fibre reinforced plastic composite materials are also play-

ing a new role in the automotive and aerospace sectors. This
material has shown promise in increasing strength, reducing
weight and lowering fuel consumption. The aim of this paper is
to study the crash behaviour and energy absorption characteristics
of a longitudinal member and provide shape optimization for bet-
ter crash responses [38,40–43].
A detailed finite element analysis using the explicit dynamics
solver AUTODYN in ANSYS is carried out using different materials
and geometries of the longitudinal member. The specific energy
absorption (SEA) and the peak crash force are considered in this
paper as the main criteria for optimization.

2. Finite element modelling

A model of a thin longitudinal member was developed for anal-

ysis using the modelling software ANSYS. The longitudinal member
has a length of 384 mm, an external area of 1156 mm, a thickness
of 1 mm and a perimeter of 136 mm with two different cross-
sectional shapes of a square and rectangle. A schematic diagram
of the finite element model with loading and boundary conditions
of the axial impact simulation for the two longitudinal members
using an impactor is shown in Fig. 1 below. The impactor moves
Fig. 2. First mode of deformation of a square.
form the right towards the left while the longitudinal member is
fixed on its bottom on the left side. Table 1 shows the dimensional
parameters of the longitudinal members and it is to be noted that
the thickness and the length of the member is 1 mm and 384 mm
respectively. The area is kept as equal as possible to the closest
whole number value. For the loading of the tube, some studies
have assigned a velocity to move the tube downward until the tube
is deformed while some studies employ an initial velocity that will
deform the longitudinal member gradually in a given time.
In this paper, it was decided that a more realistic approach
would be to assign an initial velocity to the impactor followed by
the application of a mass to the impactor.
Two material types are used during the simulations. First, a
rigid material type is applied to the impactor. This was done to

Fig. 3. Final Deformation of a square.

prevent any deformation of the longitudinal member which could

have an undesirable effect on the values of internal energy and
tube deformation results. This study focuses on two types of mate-
Fig. 1. Schematic layout of the simulation.
rial, mild steel and aluminum, the mechanical property of steel has
a density of 7850 kg/m3, Young’s Modulus is 200 GPa, Poisson’s
ratio is 0.3 and Yield stress is 250 MPa. Aluminum possess a den-
Table 1 sity of 2770 kg/m3, Young’s Modulus is 71 GPa, and a Poisson’s
Dimensional details of the longitudinal members.
ratio 0.33 and Yield stress is 145 MPa.
Profile A (mm) B (mm) T(mm) Outer Area (mm2) The material modes in AUTODYN are categorized as Linear and
Square 34 34 1 1156 Non-Linear (NL). The materials that are required to deform and
Rectangle 30.5 38 1 1159 exhibit its deformation modes beyond its yield point is labelled
as the non-linear type. In this type of material properties, the yield

Please cite this article as: S. Bhardawaj, R. C. Sharma and S. K. Sharma, Analysis of frontal car crash characteristics using ANSYS, Materials Today: Proceed-
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 S. Bhardawaj et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx 3

Fig. 4. Internal energy of a square. Fig. 7. Internal energy of rectangle.

Fig. 8. SEA vs. displacement for steel and aluminum for square and rectangle cross-
sections.

Fig. 5. second mode of deformation of a rectangle.

Fig. 9. Peak force vs. displacement for steel and aluminum with rectangle and
square cross-sections.

strength is not provided, and the factor of safety cannot be pro-

vided for these simulation results. Here, the impactor has defined
as a linear material and the longitudinal member is defined as a
Fig. 6. Deformation of a rectangle. non-linear (NL) material since the non-linear deformation of longi-

Please cite this article as: S. Bhardawaj, R. C. Sharma and S. K. Sharma, Analysis of frontal car crash characteristics using ANSYS, Materials Today: Proceed-
ings, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2019.12.358
4 S. Bhardawaj et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx
tudinal member is required to a time limit that could exceeds the
yield point.
3. Numerical simulation
To obtain accurate and realistic results, the explicit dynamics
module employing AUTODYN as the solver in ANSYS was used to
carry out the simulations. In this section, the effects of key param-
eters on the performance of crash behaviour and energy dissipa-
tion are discussed. These key parameters include impact velocity,
cross-sectional shape and material type. The effects of different
cross-sectional (CS) shapes on the longitudinal members are
addressed [44–48]. Two cross-sections of a square and rectangle
are studied. The impactor hits the longitudinal member with a
speed of 2000 mm/s and a ramping time of 0.05 s.
Two different materials, steel and aluminum, are considered in
this section. The specific energy absorption (SEA) is the main crite-
rion used to assess the weight efficiency. The peak force is also
used to define the optimum shape. A summary of the results is pre-
sented in Table 2. The first and second deformation modes of a
square and a rectangle are shown in Figs. 2 and 5 respectively. It
is seen that the deformation is in purely axial mode. Figs. 3 and
6 shows the final deformation of a square and rectangle profile
respectively and Figs. 4 and 7 shows the internal energy contour
of the square and rectangle plots respectively. The weight, SEA
and peak force for different cross-sections for both steel and alu-
minum materials are clearly presented in the plots of Fig. 8 and
Fig. 9. It is shown for both materials that the longitudinal member
with square cross section produces the better results. Although
aluminum has a 24% lower SEA value than steel, it produces a
63% savings in the total weight, which is a large benefit compared
to the SEA criterion. In all models, the force increases up to the
peak value and then decays dramatically, the decay rate is steep,
and it slowly subsides, and a gradual decay rate is noticed at the
end. In addition, the peak force in the aluminum case is reduced
by 64% compared to the steel material. The Peak force in the steel
longitudinal section is increased by 12 kN, raising the peak force by
13% and the specific energy absorption increased by 17% to a value
of 0.68 kJ/kg. Aluminum also experiences a proportional increase
in SEA and peak force when the profile is changed.
4. Conclusion
This study compared the rectangle and square shapes of the
longitudinal members to improve the energy absorption capacity
of longitudinal crash membersand to minimize the peak force
response. In this study, the shape profile and material type are
the main considerations. The numerical simulations were carried
out using the explicit finite element code LS-DYNA. From the
results discussion presented in this paper for frontal impact of lon-
gitudinal members, it is worth noting that the most desirable lon-
gitudinal member of square profile enhanced the specific energy
absorption (SEA) by 17% and the peak force also increased by
13% for a similar range of deformation. By using aluminum the
weight is decreased by 63% but the SEA also reduces by 24% and
the peak force which is directly dependent on the material
decreases by a proportion of 63% itself.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
Please cite this article as: S. Bhardawaj, R. C. Sharma and S. K. Sharma, Analysis of frontal car crash characteristics using ANSYS, Materials Today: Proceed-
ings, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2019.12.358
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