Impact model development for the reconstruction of current motorcycle accidents

Abstract This work describes the mathematical modelling of motorcycle collisions with deformable structures. It has been developed over a number of years to the current stage where the intention is to investigate actual accident situations rather than pre-described tests. A section of this reconstruction task concerns the development and validation of the computer simulation of a motorcycle crash test. The purpose of this computer modelling is to identify the applied loads to the head by using a motorcycle model and dummy rider impacting an obstacle and to apply them afterwards to a FE model of the human head. The stress distribution obtained with the FE model will show how the brain is affected during this type of impact so that we can have an idea of the injury mechanisms developed. TRL has impact-tested many motorcycles and a recent test of a Norton Commander travelling at 50kdh impacting at 90° into the side of a stationary Ford Mondeo was chosen for the development purposes of a multi-body model. The multibody modelling approach has been done with the MADYMO package and the finite element analysis with PAMCRASH explicit code.

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