Stone Impact Damage to Automotive Paint Finishes: A Precision Instrumented Impact Device for Laboratory Simulations

Stone impact damage to automotive paint finishes has drawn significant attention in recent years from both automobile manufacturers and their OEM paint suppliers. This work describes the design and implementation of a precision instrumented impact device to perform a wide range of phenomenological studies of impact processes. A precision launch mechanism, control of the appropriate impact and environmental variables, a versatile sample holder, and optional advanced instrumentation render this device useful both as a quality control bench marking tool and as an instrument to design improved impact resistant coating systems.