An approach to the standardization of accident and injury registration systems (STAIRS) in Europe
(1998)
STAIRS is a European Commission funded study whose aim is to produce a set of guidelines for a harmonised, crash injury database. The need to evaluate the effectiveness of the forthcoming European Union front and side impact directives has emphasised the need for real world crash injury data-sets that can be representative of the crash population throughout Europe. STAIRS will provide a methodology to achieve this. The ultimate aim of STAIRS is to produce a set of data collection tools which will aid decision making on vehicle crashworthiness as well as providing a means to evaluate the effectiveness of safety regulations. This paper will disseminate the up-to-date findings of the group as they try to harmonise their methods. The stage has been reached where studies into the diverse methods of the UK, French and German systems of crash injury investigation have been undertaken. An assessment has already been made of the relationships between the three current systems in order to define the areas of agreement and divergence. The conclusions reached stated that there were many areas that are already closely related and that the differences were only at the detailed level. With the emphasis on secondary safety and injury causation, core data sets were decided upon, taking into account: vehicle description, collision configuration, structural response of vehicles, restraint and airbag performance, child restraint performance, Euro NCAP, pedestrian and vehicle occupant kinematics, injury description and causation. Each variable was studied objectively, the important elements isolated and developed into a form that all partners were agreeable on. A glossary of terms is being developed as the project progresses which includes ISO standards and other definitions from the associated CAREPLUS project, which addresses the comparability of national data sets. A major consideration of the group was the data collection method to be employed. The strengths and weaknesses of each study were investigated to obtain a clear idea of which aspects offered the best way forward. The quality of this information and transference into a common format, as well as the necessary error checking systems to be employed have just been completed and are described. In tandem with this area of study the problem of the statistical relationship of each sample to the national population is also being investigated. The study proposes a mechanism to use a sample of crash injury data to represent the national and international crash injury problem
Bewertung der Fahrzeug-Fußraumintrusionen beim Offset Frontaltest gegen das Verformungselement
(1998)
In den Tests nach dem neuen Frontaltestverfahren (Entwürfe ECE R.94 sowie Richtlinie 96/79/EG und Ergänzung zu RL 70/156/EWG) entstehen hohe Verformungen der Fußräume der Versuchsfahrzeuge. Die Bewertung der Gefährdung der Insassen durch Intrusion, vorwiegend der Spritzwand begleitet von heftigen Bewegungen der Pedale, soll durch am Dummy zu messende Schutzkriterien erfolgen. Es ist vorgesehen, an den Dummies die Verschiebung des Schienbeins gegen das Knie, die Längskraft im Unterschenkel und den sogenannten Tibia Index zu messen. Um dieses zu ermöglichen, mussten an den vorhandenen Dummy-Unterschenkeln konstruktive Änderungen vorgenommen werden. Über die Herleitung der Schutzkriterien, Fragen bei der Anwendung dieser Kriterien sowie die technischen Einzelheiten und die Zertifizierung der neuen Dummy-Unterschenkel, welche die erforderlichen Messungen erlauben, wird berichtet.