Virtual Development Support of Active Bonnet Pedestrian Safety Systems by CAE/FE-Methods

Active bonnet safety systems are implemented into vehicles, to fulfill pedestrian head impact requirements despite little available deformation space. For such systems it is necessary to consider a variety of aspects already from the very beginning of the vehicle design process and the functionality of the whole system needs to be continually cross-checked throughout the whole design process. Many of these aspects are already supported by finite element (FE) methods from vehicle manufacturers and in this paper it is shown, how the last missing links within the development process, the optimization of pedestrian detection sensor signals can also be efficiently supported by FE simulation. The modeling and validation of a pressure tube based sensor system and so called “misuse objects” are demonstrated. Exemplar simulated signal shapes are shown for a variety of impacts situations with different pedestrian dummy shapes, hardest-to-detect pedestrian test tools (PDI-2) and several misuse objects. Examples for the benefit of the virtual support of sensor integration and optimization are given but also the current limitations of this method and future development work in this area are addressed.