Arturo Furones Crespo

EXPERIMENTAL ASSESMENT OF THE STRENGTH OF COACHES STRUCTURES AFTER COLLISION REPAIR

Vehicles repair after an accident and the quality assurance of the repair is a major safety issue. If the vehicle type category is M3, collective road transport vehicles, there is an additional concern due to their high number of occupants, the responsibility of third parties transport and the severity of some type of collisions such as rollovers. Moreover it has to be considered that the high cost of these vehicles and the investment made on them by the transport companies makes it profitable to proceed to their repair after some accidents. In this work it is quantified the loss of energy absorption capabilities of the structural steel profiles of rectangular hollow section used in the construction of these vehicles. The deformation energy has been measured by means of bending tests and calculating the bending moment vs bending angle curve. The load has been applied to reach 10, 15 and 20 permanent bending angles, representing those rollover structural deformations found on coach collisions of different severities. All test specimens have been straightened and bended up to 20 degrees some in the same bending direction as initial bend test and some in the opposite direction. The results show a significant loss of strength of the profiles and the final influence on a repaired structure has been quantified modeling with a FEM model a standard Regulation ECE 66 of Geneva type approval test. It is then demonstrated how it should be defined requirements for repaired buses and coaches after their repair of structural damages in collisions. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4995/CIT2016.2016.4040

Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Active Safety Systems in Vans with Respect to Real World Accident Analysis

This paper belongs to “F08: Vehicle Controls on Handling and Stability” topic. It is aimed to assess the potential influence of three active safety systems—the Antilock Brake System (ABS), the Brake Assist System (BAS) and the Electronic Stability Programme (ESP)—in collisions with vans involved, through the analysis of fatal real world accidents occurred in Spain. The methodology follows during this study is based on a retrospective accident analysis of the technical reports of the Spanish Traffic Directorate (DGT). A detailed database has been compiled by the INSIA—UPM accident analysis department, comprising 254 fatal accidents with vans involved, occurred in rural roads during 2009 and 2010. In case of fatal accidents, these reports prepared by the Spanish Traffic Police show a high quality data. This information has been analysed to identify major accidents and causes of accidents (HFF method), in order to identify reference accident scenarios, which take into account the active safety systems proposed. A sample of these accidents, selected from the most representative scenarios, has been re-analyzed and re-evaluated considering the assumed effect of each specific active safety system. Although the performance of active safety systems explains basically their behaviour in test conditions, they are not sufficient to assess their success in each real world situation. Active Safety systems interact with the driver, the vehicle and the environment. A full forecast of their potential is only possible by modelling the driver-vehicle-system-environment. This methodology has already been applied by authors to evaluate the effectiveness of active safety systems in case of pedestrian accidents. This study continues the same research line based on real world accidents analysis, applied to accidents involving vans. The findings show that a number of the collisions could have been avoided by implementing these systems. Even though comprising a small number of cases, it is an invaluable resource for monitoring real world performance of active safety systems.

Van Traffic Accident Analysis. A Holistic Approach

From 2003 on, the numbers of accidents and victims have decreased significantly in Spain: the number of deaths was in 2010 54 % below that of 2003. This has been to a great extent the results of several safety policy measures such as the penalty point system, surveillance and control campaigns and a considerable increase in the media of road safety-related issues. However, accidents with involvement of vans (LGV’s less than 3500 kg) have not followed this trend, and thus the contribution of this kind of vehicles to the global figures has risen. Within this context, INSIA has conducted an ambitious research project, developed with the purpose of an integrated analysis of the different factors which can explain the accidental behavior of this kind of vehicles. In this paper analyze in greater depth the validity of one of the initial hypothesis: “vans may have a different dynamic behavior from passenger cars, and thus accident rates may be higher if they are driven like a passenger car”. The basis of the working hypotheses are essentially related to the behavior of the vehicle with respect to safety distances, reaction times and braking capacities of the vehicle behind, and on the influence of loads.