In rear passenger seats it is very important to avoid the impact of the occupant against the back of the front seat,or at least to reduce the magnitude of this contact in order to minimise the injuries. Numerical simulations are also used for the development and optimisation of this type of occupant protection systems. In the figure the model developed for this study is represented.
The seat has been modelled by means of shell elements and the mechanical properties of the involved materials have been implemented in the model accordingly to the characterisation tests results. The different components have been assembled by means of joints and welding entities. Several parts have been modelled with solid elements (seat foams, headrest). The masses of the different components have been checked in order to assure to be the same than in the real part. Belt modelling has been done from the experimental curves obtained in tensile test, and it is defined by means of only tension non linear bar elements. In the simulation the stress - strain curve of this element has to be specified.
The dummy model used in the simulation is based on a rigid bodies assembly representing the different parts of the real dummy hardware. These rigid bodies are linked between them by means of joints which allow to obtain outputs in terms of forces, moments, ...