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This paper describes the design and development of a family of surrogate child restraints that are intended for use in developing and testing occupant sensing and classification systems. Detailed measurements were made of the geometry and mass distribution characteristics of 34 commercial child restraints, including infant restraints, convertibles, combination restraints, and boosters. The restraints were installed in three test seats with appropriately sized crash dummies to obtain data on seat-surface pressure patterns and the position and orientation of the restraint with belt loading. The data were used to construct two surrogates with removable components. The convertible surrogate can be used to represent a rear-facing infant restraint with or without a base, a rear-facing convertible, or a forward-facing convertible. The booster surrogate can represent a high-back belt-positioning booster, a backless booster, or a forward-facing-only restraint with a five-point harness.

An Advanced Radioisotope Power System (ARPS) in the 150 watt class is currently under development for space applications. The ARPS is a potential power source for potential NASA missions to Europa in 2003 and Pluto/Kuiper in 2004. The ARPS system, which has been described in recent literature (Hendricks, 1997), will utilize a multi-tube Alkali Metal Thermal to Electric Converter (AMTEC) cell design. Designated EPX-1, the cell is designed to survive ground handling and launch stresses and provide reliable power for the duration of the missions. The EPX-1 AMTEC cell is based on the PX series of demonstration cells (Borkowski, 1997, and Sievers, 1998). The planned operating temperatures and life requirements for these missions have made an all refractory metal design a requirement. Several other design enhancements have been implemented to meet specific mission requirements and improve predicted cell reliability.