A study of crash boxes referred to energy absorption

Abstract

Nowadays, an automotive industry steadily has been growing and playing a major role on economy development for many years. The crash box is one of the most important parts for safety but it was found that the crash boxes manufactured domestically are not met international standard requirements. This is due to process and material limitation. This process for automotive safety test requires high budget and there is unclear approach for specific test. Therefore, a study of crash boxes referred to energy absorption project was conducted as an alternative choice of testing. Regarding to the problems as addressed above, this project was aimed to design and test crash boxes which come in various structures; simple type, corrugated type and honeycomb type of crash box. In addition, it was also emphasized in studying energy absorption behavior and physical deformation of crash boxes after dynamic and static energy being applied. Numeric simulation and static test methodology of front collision were applied for these tests in reference to USA NCAP standard for automobile collision test. Testing all types of crash boxes indicated that the corrugated type was able to absorb energy at 2.8% and 5.9% higher than honeycomb type and rectangular type, respectively. This is capable to pickup stress and strain continually and effecting to more energy absorb than another type. Additionally, this corrugated structure is feasible and suitable for crash box design in automotive manufacturing.