The Traffic Accident Reconstruction Origin -ARnews-

Re: air bags

Wilt Nelson (WIL7MO@aol.com)
Sun, 5 Apr 1998 13:46:10 -0400 (EDT)

You should be able to use a good crash program or even an "eye-ball" estimate of the impact speed experienced by the vehicle and judge if the sensor was in an environment above the deployment threshhold set by the manufacturer (typically 10 to 15 mph)
I had responsibility for the GM airbag field program and in many cases if the bag went off and they occupants were not injured or had minor injury (protected by the bags) they were upset and stated they shouldn't have deployed. Conversely, if the bag didn't deploy in a minor crash (without injury or minor injury) they were upset that it did not deploy. The deployment threshold is set for a crash level where injury begins, but remember that there is a range of human tolerance above and below that threshold level so people could be injured with a system that is designed OK.
Wilt
Wilt Nelson
WIL7MO@aol.com

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