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The Articulated Total Body (ATB) program has been used to study occupant kinematics in motor vehicle collisions for several years. The ATB model is a complex 3-dimensional lumped-mass model available for many different computer systems, including the personal computer, and requires formatted data files for the data input. A new version of this model, Graphical Articulated Total Body (GATB), has been developed to be operated under the HVE (Human, Vehicle, Environment) computer environment. The GATB program uses the graphical system built into HVE. This aids in set up and execution of the model to study human occupants in motor vehicle collisions. This paper addresses the integration of the ATB model with the HVE environment and includes a validation study comparing the GATB results to those of the ATB program.

Lighting and signaling regulations vary considerably around the world. There are 3 main regulatory regions: the United States, Europe and Japan. Rules vary in scope as well as in strictly technical requirements. The ECE has published the most comprehensive regulations, covering even headlamp leveling and cleaning devices. Japan has, for the time being, the least extensive ones. Standard lamp Regulations are pretty much alike, with the center high mounted stop lamp being the most notable exception. The most pronounced differences are for headlamps: all values above the horizon line are lower in Europe where being dazzled is not accepted. The cutoff line is also sharper in Europe, where visual aim has been common practice for 70 years. Europe specifies amber rear side markers and amber rear turn signals but prohibits red contour markings as well as rear turn signals and red rear side markers. Differences are more acute in the field of procedures.

Without good-quality measurements taken at the time of an accident the analyst is faced with the need to extract measurement data from incident scene photographs. This paper discusses the history and development of the mathematical model for two-dimensional (2D) single exposure analytical photogrammetry, presents the software PC-Rect, and compares the analytical results obtained with PC-Rect to survey results. The sensitivity of the analytical results to the variation in such parameters as subject distance, camera height, digital photograph resolution, and bitmap density is discussed. The concept of using the directly rectified scanned photograph in the reconstruction task is introduced, and the utility of performing the dynamic simulation directly on the rectified photograph is discussed.

Lean burn and EGR are two commonly used technologies for improving fuel consumption and controlling emissions. Each has advantages and disadvantages when applied to an engine and, qualitatively at least, these effects are well known. To meet future emissions and fuel consumption constraints, most production engines are likely to use one or the other. This paper describes testing undertaken to quantify the opportunities that each strategy offers on a production engine. The engine used in this test program was a modern, four valve per cylinder l-4, with high charge activity features including one high swirl port per pair and one straight port with a deactivation plate. This engine is designed to operate with mixtures as lean as 24:1 during normal operation. It was tested at a number of part load operating conditions typical of an emissions drive-cycle over a range of air-fuel ratios.

Methods to quantify the gasoline vapors displaced from a tank when refilling an ORVR vehicle are presented. Three predictive modeling techniques that approximate refueling vapor mass and composition are summarized. Some of these modeling techniques provide a convenient and reasonable approximation of real-life fueling events as demonstrated by testing conducted on production fuel system components. The application of the models to vehicle engineering is demonstrated in examples.

Neon discharge lamps contribute four main benefits in automotive rear signalling applications, longevity, efficacy, speed of response and most importantly styling versatility. In systems demonstrated to date, the styling advantages have failed to materialize whilst the cost of implementation has been discouragingly high. Together, Corning and Tunewell seek to solve these problems through the use of sophisticated glass processing and novel power distribution technologies, and the adoption of a systems approach to design to minimise cost. A glass molding process will be detailed permitting the integration of optimal topology discharge channels with compact optics and connection systems into any curved, laminar form required by the lamp designer. Clear aesthetic advantages over incandescent and LED technologies can be shown due to the extended, uniform light source and the precise placement of its associate optics.

The effects of tumble flow generated by various intake ports on the lean burn characteristics in a four-valve pentroof engine were investigated. Tumble intensities were tested for three intake ports of different entry angle; 25°, 20° and 15°. The flow characteristics in cylinder were measured under motored conditions with laser Doppler velocimetry. The lean burn performances were examined in an operating 4-cylinder engine. The combustion duration under lean mixture conditions were calculated by heat release analysis of the pressure trace. The flame developments in a single-cylinder optical engine were visualized with an image-intensified CCD camera to see the effect of different flow patterns with three inlet ports of strong and weak tumble. It was found that there is a correlation between the stronger tumble during induction and the higher convective velocity and turbulence levels at the time of ignition, which result in faster and stable combustion under lean mixture conditions.

We report a low-cost fiber-optic combustion pressure sensor integrated with an ignition system of a passenger car. A miniature sensor is attached to a shaft extending from the spark plug boot. Simultaneously with the boot mounting on the spark plug the sensor shaft is pressed into a cylindrical hole of a modified production spark plug. The sensor cable is combined either with the boot, or boot and high voltage cable, depending whether a coil-at-plug or a Distributed Ignition System is used, respectively. The sensor optical and Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) components are packaged inside a miniature module, embedded either in a coil-at-plug package or a Distribute Ignition System module. Engine test results are reported for a single-cylinder, gasoline fueled stationary gen-set engine.

Increasingly stringent emissions regulations and customer demands for high efficiency and smooth performance demand highly accurate control of the air-fuel ratio of automotive spark-ignition engines. Electronic port fuel injection provides the necessary control by adding a precise quantity of fuel for a given amount of air drawn in by the engine. Ideally, the metered fuel will consist only of fine droplets and vapor. In reality, the fuel spray impinges upon the walls of the intake port, creating a liquid fuel film. The fundamentally different transport mechanisms of the liquid fuel compared to vapor or fine droplets greatly complicates; the analysis of the fuel delivery system. Past research has provided models of fuel film dynamics in intake ports of port-fuel-injected engines, yet to date no practical method of measuring fuel films has been presented.

Automotive fuel vapor emissions that would otherwise evaporate into the atmosphere are being captured in activated carbon vapor storage canisters. Fuel vapor is loaded into the canisters via a direct connection to the fuel tank vapor dome. Hydrocarbons are desorbed from the activated carbon into the engine combustion cylinders using engine intake vacuum. The carbon canister capacity requirements have increased in recent years in order to meet both Enhanced Evaporative Emission regulations and the Clean Air Act emission requirements for On-board Refueling Vapor Recovery (ORVR). The higher capacity requirements have generated the need for larger volume canisters that can meet the emission requirements and still be designed within the space and packaging limits of the vehicle application. This paper describes the simultaneous engineering approach used at Ford Motor Company to design a large volume cylindrical shaped carbon canister.

Revisions to the FMVSS 201 head impact legislation have had a significant impact on the design and engineering of upper interior trim components of cars and light trucks. Structural performance with energy absorbing capability to prevent head injury is now a significant addition to these requirements. However, occupant visibility blockage limits the amount of packaging space available for implementing countermeasures in this area. A novel approach to meeting the FMVSS 201 structural requirements, while keeping the interior trim on the vehicle minimally changed, has been developed. This approach requires the use of energy absorbing rib structures sandwiched between the trim panel and the inner body-in-white (B/W) sheet metal in A and B pillars. Heat staking is used to attach the rib structure to the interior trim panel.

Several studies show that oil within coils or stacked stock will follow a more or less consistent pattern of oil movement or migration. Changes in viscosity from low to high shows no difference in general pattern gravity is the overlying influence on oil migration. Oil will move within the coil wraps and between stacked sheets.

Due to their low specific speed, Periphery pumps, allow high heads with small flow rates and present performance curves with very stable features. This kind of pump is also smaller and simpler to construct than equivalent volumetric pumps though they have a fairly low efficiency, due to the inherent characteristics of their fluid-dynamic behaviour. Over the past few years, periphery pumps have been subject to more and more interest in the automotive field, as injection pumps in spark ignition engines, in fact, for this purpose, they are highly competitive due to their reduced dimensions, low cost, high reliability and good priming behaviour. In the past many theories were presented to explain the behaviour of periphery pumps and to calculate their performances, but these theories usually need extensive experimental support.

A new, standard laboratory test (SAE J 2334) for evaluation of the cosmetic corrosion resistance of autobody steel sheet has been developed through the joint efforts of SAE's Automotive Corrosion Prevention Committee (SAE/ACAP) and the Auto/Steel Partnership's (A/SP) Corrosion Task Force. Results from this test give an excellent correlation with those of on-vehicle tests conducted in Montreal, Quebec, and St. John's, Newfoundland. To establish the precision of the new test, nine laboratories participated in a round-robin evaluation. Each laboratory tested ten standard, painted automotive steel sheet products. The results of this work are analyzed in terms of within-lab repeatability and lab-to-lab reproducibility, and they are an important and final milestone in the development and specification of the new test

Lateral load balance may be important in some rollover incidents and may provide a measure that could relate to the pavement damage from unbalanced loading. Individual wheel loading was measured on 92 heavy trucks operating in western Oregon during 1995. This paper presents the analysis of those results in the form of distributions for various categories of wheel loads and for several unbalance measures. Unbalance was found to have approximately normal statistical distribution with the center of gravity off-set up to 4 inches from the vehicle center. For axle sets the center of gravity off-set was up to 7.5 inches.

A model based on an ionization equilibrium analysis, that can relate the ion current to the state of the gas inside the combustion volume, has been presented earlier. This paper introduces several additional models, that together with the previous model have the purpose of improving the pressure predictions. One of the models is a chemistry model that enables us to realistically consider the current contribution from the most relevant species. A second model can predict the crank angle of the peak pressure and thereby substantially increase the accuracy of the pressure predictions. Several other additions and improvements have been introduced, including support for part load engine conditions.

The process of gathering information, analysis, and selection of ride and handling goals for the 1997 Chevrolet Corvette is described. The goals consist of measurable objective metrics and standardized subjective evaluation. The input elements of the process are: the Voice of the Customer, Engineering Direction and Competitive Assessment. As values are developed for the each metric, synthesis and analysis methods are used to confirm the full set of metrics are consistent and non-exclusive. The targets selected guided the chassis design and development of the 1997 Chevrolet Corvette to insure outstanding customer satisfaction in handling and ride.

The turbocharger, consisting of a radial or axial flow turbine and an radial flow compressor presents perhaps one of the most challenging tasks to the turbomachinery designer. Due to the necessity of speed changes in the diesel engine, the turbocharger transits a wide variety of operating points in its normal operation. During an engine speed acceleration or deceleration there will be a lag in the required air delivery to the engine, resulting in increased smoke emission and limiting the power delivered by the engine. In order to investigate the dynamic performance of a turbocharged engine, an essential first step must be the development of an adequate model for transient characteristics of the turbocharger. One of the significant problems that must be overcome for the modeling effort to be successful is a detailed experimental description of the transient performance of the device.

We have developed a vehicle test system called the Vehicle Dynamics Simulator (VDS). The system measures the handling characteristics in a transient state in the laboratory. The automobile suspensions are moved as on a road with the machine providing relative motion by force transducer platform beneath each tire. The detailed measurements of transitive motions and forces given to the wheel clarify the kinematics and compliance characteristics contributed to the good handling performance and stability. This paper presents the system introduction and the results of analyzing the suspensions characteristics by the new analytical technique for breaking down into a variety of compliance components in a transient state.

With the advent of stricter vehicle emission standards, the improvement of three way catalyst performance and durability remains a pressing issue. A critical consideration in catalyst design is the potential for variations in fuel sulfur levels to have a significant impact on the ability to reach TLEV, LEV, and ULEV emission levels. As a result, a better understanding of the role of PGM composition in the interplay between thermal durability and sulfur tolerance is required. Three way catalysts representative of standard Pd-only, Pd/Rh and Pt/Rh formulations were studied over a variety of aging and evaluation conditions. The parameters investigated included aging temperature, air fuel ratio and sulfur level. Evaluations were performed on a 1994 TLEV vehicle using different sulfur level fuels. The effect of PGM loading was also included within the study.