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Cloth- and leather-upholstered passenger seats equipped with NEC seat-based electric field sensors were tested using three crash test dummies, a 12-month-old CRABI, 6-year-old Hybrid III and 5th-percentile female Hybrid III. The crash test dummies were tested in the normal condition and in a modified condition where they were covered with conductive plastic. Human subjects were also tested so that the response from the crash test dummies could be compared with their human counterparts. A number of seated positions were analyzed in the ungrounded condition. Additional tests were conducted with children in forward-facing booster seats and one infant in rear-facing infant seats.

The introduction of occupant position sensors into automobiles raises questions about the response of these sensors to the child crash test dummies and the relationship of these responses to those of child human subjects. This paper extends earlier work on the small female and mid-sized male Hybrid IIIs to new work on the 6-year-old Hybrid III. Testing was conducted with 6 year-old children human volunteer subjects using three sensor technologies, capacitive, electric field, and ultrasonic. This testing was conducted in the laboratory with the sensors mounted at the face/chest level of the children. The capacitive and electric field sensor responses to the 6 year-old Hybrid III and children were more similar than the response of the sensors to the 5th percentile female and 50th percentile male Hybrid III crash test dummies to the comparable adult human subjects.

This paper examined existing data acquisition technologies and proposes an alternative method to gather and store data. This proposed method significantly reduces the size of the cable bundle that interconnects the crash test dummy with the control room, vehicle or sled mounted to five wires, three for power, two for the communications bus. A systems analysis reviewed the requirements for data acquisition for crash test dummies and determined that the proposed system, a distributed data acquisition system, was a promising solution to the problem. This approach would replace one central data acquisition system with numerous data acquisition systems distributed through out the dummy. Each distributed data acquisition module would have eight channels and could be used singly or in-groups. At the core of each module would be an Analog Devices ADuC812 component that handles the analog to digital conversion, data acquisition control, memory management, and the communications bus.

The introduction of occupant position sensors into automobiles raises questions about the response of these sensors to current crash test dummies. To adequately test the performance of these sensors in a crash environment, it is crucial that crash test dummies resemble humans. Each sensor technology perceives the crash test dummy as being different from a human. These differences range considerably. The differences for four sensor technologies, capacitive, electric field, ultrasonic and pressure pattern, are described. The differences between humans and crash test dummies are discussed, along with possible modifications to the crash test dummies that improve the biofidelity of the crash test dummy. Results will be presented from testing on a mid-sized male and small female.

Ultrasonic, capacitive, and infrared (IR) occupant position sensors were tested to determine their compatibility with crash test dummies. In this phase of testing, the sensors' responses to a Hybrid III 50th percentile male crash test dummy were compared to those of a human male of similar size. After the data were compared, crash test dummy modifications were developed so that sensor responses to the dummies more closely resembled their responses to humans. Ultrasonic sensors detected little difference between the dummy and the human. However, testing of capacitive and infrared sensors revealed differences in their responses to a crash test dummy and a human subject.