Khairil Anwar Abu Kassim

Development of Mobile Deformable Barrier for Side Impact Crashworthiness Evaluation in ASEAN New Car Assessment Programme (ASEAN NCAP)

Side impact crash test simulates a road crash wherein the side of a vehicle is being impacted, either perpendicularly or at an angle, by the front-end of another vehicle of about similar mass. In Malaysia, this crash configuration is the second leading cause of fatality and injury in road crashes after frontal collision. Extensive research have been carried out worldwide in order to mitigate occupant injury in side impact collision through provision of side impact protection system in vehicle such as side impact airbags and side door bars. As a result, various global regulations and consumer test requirements concerning side impacts have been established to evaluate the effectiveness of the said protection system. Recently, the Malaysian government has implemented the United Nation’s regulation pertaining to side impact protection (UN Regulation 95) for new passenger vehicles in the country. Hence, as a newly established automobile safety rating programme in the region, the ASEAN New Car Assessment Programme (ASEAN NCAP) has a plan in the pipeline to implement UN R95 side impact crash test tentatively in its future assessment scheme. A mobile deformable barrier (MDB) was developed as a preparation towards implementing the ASEAN NCAP’s side impact crashworthiness evaluation. This paper describes characteristics and requirements of the UN R95 as well as the development of the MDB according to the regulation. Several tests and improvements were conducted to ensure the MDB is reliable and having high repeatability for testing.

Preliminary Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) for Safety Assist Technologies in ASEAN NCAP – Rationalizing the Impact to Road Safety for Malaysia’s Case

The newly established New Car Assessment Program for Southeast Asian Countries (ASEAN NCAP) has incorporated Safety Assist Technologies (SATs) in its automobile safety rating scheme. In order for any assessed car to be eligible for the maximum 5-star rating, it should first be equipped with Electronic Stability Control (ESC) and fitted with seatbelt reminder (SBR). However, since these SATs are not being evaluated in their performance by the means of field testing, this paper explains the benefit of having these SATs through Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) which help to rationalize the importance of SATs in preventing road accidents or mitigating severity of injuries. Due to data limitation, this preliminary CBA assessment will only be focusing on Malaysia’s situation and is based on published sources and the authors’ best estimates. This study also includes the Cost-Benefit Analysis on Anti-lock Braking System (ABS), which is the basis for ESC technology, in preparation for its inclusion in the future rating scheme to expedite the vision of making ABS as standard fit in all ASEAN’s passenger cars. The preliminary result shows that all technologies – ESC, SBR and ABS – appear to be cost-effective (benefit/cost-ratio > 3) or most likely cost effective (1 < benefit/cost-ratio < 3) in Malaysia’s road safety situation per se.

Assessment of Child Occupant Protection in ASEAN NCAP

Statistics show that child traffic injuries are a public health problem globally, including Southeast Asia (SEA) region. With an overall value of road traffic death rate among children of 7.4 per 100,000 populations has put SEA as the second region to have the highest death rate after Africa. Due to this alarming figure, many safety interventions and inventions have been introduced and implemented to mitigate child injuries resulted from road traffic accidents. One of them is the establishment of crashworthiness rating programme for new passenger cars to evaluate the resulted child injuries via destructive tests. The New Car Assessment Programme for Southeast Asia region (ASEAN NCAP) established to elevate vehicle safety standards, raise consumer awareness and encourage market for saver vehicles in the dedicated region. Currently the programme assessed and rated passenger cars based on performance of adult and child occupant protection in frontal offset crash tests. Since its introduction, ASEAN NCAP has crash tested 28 popular passenger cars throughout its development phases. During these phases, there has been improvement on the rating of child occupant protection (COP) with the increase of number of cars getting 4-star. This paper presents the results of ASEAN NCAP tests for the development phases in term of COP rating as well as provides explanation on the related assessment.

New Car Assessment Program for Southeast Asian Countries: Current Status and Future Developments

In line with the Vehicle Pillar of the United Nations Decade of Action for Global Road Safety 2011 2020 in elevating motor vehicle safety standards and encouraging a market for safer vehicles in the region, a new car assessment program for Southeast Asian countries (ASEAN NCAP) was recently established. During the first phase of the program, seven popular car models were selected and tested according to European New Car Assessment Program (Euro NCAP) protocol on offset frontal crash test. Thus, this paper reports the results for the completed phase along with the ratings for adult and child occupant protections. Future developments of this program as well as manufacturer responses are also discussed.

Assessment of Bus Interior Design in Malaysia

Road accidents involving bus in Malaysia is very alarming. National statistics showed that bus accident cases increased significantly at 48% between the year 2006 and the year 2008. This study focuses on design of bus concerningon ergonomics factors to eliminate injury that may pose to bus passenger either in collision or non-collision event. Data sourcethat used for this paper were obtained from bus a carried out at PUSPAKOM. This study managed to assess 224 samples and collected measurement for items stated in UN R36. Several design issues that can potentially contribute to passenger injury such as doors, seats, handrail and steps are highlighted and discussed in this paper. Findings from this paper revealed that current regulation already address the critical measurement to ensure passenger safety is taking care while in the bus. However, some related items seem to be obsolete and need to be revised accordingly.

Prevalence of Carrying Multiple Pillion Riders on the Route to School

A cross-sectional observation surveys was carried out among 6 to 12 years old child pillion riders travelling to and from schools by motorcycle. The study focused on prevalence of multiple child pillion riders, to determine the relationship between child pillion riders safety helmet compliance and their seating position and foot peg utilization. A total of 701 riders and 913 school children were observed. Riders safety helmet use rate was significantly higher (66.8%) than as compared to child pillion rider helmet use (14.7%) with OR=11.7 (95%CI 9.2-14.9). It was observed that 29.1% riders were carrying more than one child pillion riders; with female rider are more likely to carry more than one pillion rider (OR=1.6, 95%CI 1.1-2.2). Observation on utilization of foot peg showed that back motorcycle pillion rider (BP) were more likely to use foot peg as compared to middle motorcycle pillion rider (MP) (OR=11.7, 95%CI 7.8, 17.5). Safety helmet use by child pillion rider on the route to school is generally low. Furthermore, there was a significant difference for child pillion rider safety helmet use compliance according to seating position. Children who were seated in the middle are less likely to use safety helmet. Rear child pillion riders had higher chance to utilize motorcycle foot peg. To increase the prevalence of helmet use and safety of children, there is a need for public awareness campaigns on the safety benefits of safety helmets use among school children and ergonomically designed motorcycle while riding.