Kazuhiro Matsuhashi

Seat Lumbar Support Evaluation With ASPECT Manikin

Seat lumbar support is thought to be essential for seating comfort as it plays important role in the drivers fatigue during long term driving. We tried to evaluate the lumbar support performance objectively with Seat Pressure Distribution. First, the tolerance in the measurement was eliminated by application of ASPECT manikin that reproduced a human seating torso posture [1, 2]. Second, an analysis method to visualize the seat support balance on the human back was developed. Third, a hypothesis for the optimal support balance to minimize the fatigue was proposed according to the fatigue growing mechanisms. Examining the deviation of each seat result from the optimal support, the performances were quantitatively evaluated. In addition to that, the effect of the lumbar support adjuster was taken into consideration to predict the market evaluation more precisely.

Seat Lateral Support Evaluation With SAE Manikin

In this report, we proposed an objective evaluation method of the seat lateral support according to the mechanisms to create the performance differences that we reported previously [1]. First, we showed an effect of scrutinizing Seat Pressure Distributions change during vehicle turn to gain a quantitative index for explaining subjective evaluation results. Second, we showed the examples of the differences of the results according to the subjects and selected the best-correlated subject among them with a market survey result. Then, we contrived a loading condition to SAE manikin to reproduce the subjects Seat Pressure Distribution. Final, by a specific calculation of the Seat Pressure Distribution, the method to indicate the performance rating that had strong correlation with market survey was clarified.