JP2003286626A - Air bag - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an air bag which is disposed in front of a seat, protects the leg portions of a crew, is extremely fast, and can compactly be received. <P>SOLUTION: This air bag formed by joining two main body base fabrics in a bag-like shape and used for protecting the leg portions of the crew is characterized by joining the outer periphery of the air bag in an approximately quadrilateral shape by a double-weaving method, using yarns of ≤950 dtex for the double woven fabric, and controlling the cover factor of the main body base fabric to ≥1,700. The expanded portion of the air bag preferably comprises a plurality of hollow portions formed with bound belts disposed in approximately parallel to at least one of four sides constituting the outer periphery of the air bag. A covering material for imparting airtightness is preferably applied to at least one side of the air bag. The air bag protects the knee portions or ankles of the crew. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a vehicle collision,
The present invention relates to an airbag for protecting an occupant, for example, an extremely robust airbag which is disposed in front of a seat and protects a lower body such as an occupant's knees and ankles and legs.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, an airbag system has become widespread as a safety device for protecting an occupant, and the number of wearing parts has increased, such as from a driver's seat to a passenger's seat, a side collision protection, and a rear seat. In particular, airbags that protect passengers from the impact of frontal collisions, that is, airbags for the front seat (for the driver's seat and passenger's seat)
Is so popular that it is standard equipment on most passenger cars.
These front seat bags contact the upper body of the occupant, for example, the head, face, chest, etc. at the time of a vehicle collision to absorb and absorb the impact and protect the occupant safely.

On the other hand, as a means for protecting the lower body of an occupant, for example, legs such as knees and ankles, a knee bolster has hitherto been used to absorb a shock even if the legs come into contact with a lower portion of a dashboard or an instrument panel. A shock absorbing plate such as a knee panel or a shock absorbing material provided around the pedals is attached. However, although these shock absorbers have higher rigidity as compared with airbags used in other parts and absorb the shock to the occupant, it was not always satisfactory in terms of protecting the occupant.

Therefore, similar to the airbag for protecting the upper body of the occupant, an attempt has been made to further enhance the occupant protective performance by using the airbag for protecting the lower body legs, especially the knees and ankles. . For example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2000-2114
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 58-58 discloses a bag in which the back edges of two base cloths that are brought into contact with each other are sewn together and the peripheral edges of the base cloth are formed with a plurality of partial overlap stitches. . Further, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2000-289562, the occupant's foot is placed on a floor portion of a vehicle compartment on which the foot portion is placed, and the bag is inflated and expanded between the foot tread and the floor portion, and is adhered by stitching, bonding or the like into a bag shape. As such an airbag, a foot airbag has been proposed in which the thickness of the inflated portion of the portion in contact with the heel is larger than the thickness of the inflated portion of the portion in contact with the toe.

[0005]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide a robust airbag suitable for an airbag for protecting lower limbs and legs of an occupant and capable of withstanding extremely high internal pressure and impact. It is what

[0006]

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION The present application is directed to a compressive pressure when an occupant's leg, particularly a knee, abuts, or a heel push-up pressure for alleviating an internal bending force applied to an ankle. Disclosed is a base fabric for obtaining an airbag for leg protection that can withstand an extremely high internal pressure.The present invention has extremely high shock absorption compared to a conventional panel with high rigidity, and further, to an occupant. It is possible to reasonably provide a leg impact absorbing device with little damage.

That is, the present invention is (1) an airbag for protecting legs of an occupant, which is formed by joining two body base fabrics in a bag shape, and the outer periphery of the airbag has a substantially quadrilateral shape. They are joined by a bag cloth, the bag cloth uses a thread of 950 decitex or less, and the cover factor of the main body base cloth is 1
An air bag characterized by being 700 or more, (2)
(1) The inflatable portion of the airbag comprises a plurality of hollow portions formed by a binding band of a hollow weave provided substantially parallel to at least one of the four sides forming the outer periphery of the airbag. (3) The airbag according to (1) or (2), wherein at least one surface of the airbag is provided with a covering material for providing airtightness, and (4) the airbag. Is a knee bag for protecting the knees of an occupant. (1) to
(3) The airbag, (5) the airbag is a footbag for protecting an occupant's ankle, and the airbag according to (1) to (3) above.

The airbag of the present invention has a quadrilateral outer periphery joined by a hollow weave. An airbag that protects the lower half of the occupant has a smaller capacity and shape than the front seat bag, side bag, and rear seat bag that are mounted to protect the upper half of the body. Compared with the conventional method in which the base cloth is cut and sewn, the bag body can be obtained very easily by forming the outer periphery with a hollow weave. Also, by making the outer periphery into a quadrilateral, it is possible to use a simple equipment such as a dobby loom without using a jacquard loom used for a bag having a complicated shape such as a circular bag or a curtain bag that is deployed in a window. An airbag is obtained. The inflatable portion of the airbag whose outer periphery is formed into a substantially quadrilateral shape does not need to be provided with a joining portion. However, when the joining portion is provided, a joining method other than the double woven article, that is, a method such as sewing, bonding, or welding. The expansion part may be divided into a plurality of hollow parts by joining with each other. The quadrilateral here means a shape in which the outer circumference is composed of straight lines of four sides,
A curve having a large curvature may be partially included, and an angle of a corner portion, which is an intersection of two adjacent sides, may be an acute angle, a right angle, an obtuse angle, or the like. Further, the four sides may or may not be parallel to each other, and the lengths of the four sides may or may not be equal.

[0009] It is important that the bag weave uses threads of 950 decitex or less and the cover factor of the main body base fabric is 1700 or more. In the present invention, a robust and compact airbag can be obtained by using a thread having a thickness of 950 decitex or less, preferably 235 to 950 decitex, and more preferably 350 to 950 decitex. Using a yarn with a thickness of more than 950 decitex is robust, but not only makes the folded bag bulky, but also makes the bag heavier. Regarding the strength of the yarn, it is preferable to use a yarn of 7.0 to 9.5 cN / dtex.

The cover factor CF of the main body base cloth must be 1700 or more, preferably 1800 to 2600, and more preferably 1900 to 2600. When the cover factor is less than 1700, it is difficult to obtain a robust airbag. Here, the cover factor is a parameter representing the density of the woven structure, which is obtained by the product of the thickness of the warp and the weft (decitex) and the woven density of the warp and the weft (book / inch), and is represented by the following formula. CF = √Dw × Nw + √Df × Nf where Dw And Df are the thickness of warp and weft (d tex) Nw and Nf are the fabric density of warp and weft (book /
In the present invention, the inflatable portion of the airbag may be formed from a plurality of hollow portions formed by a binding band of a hollow weave provided substantially parallel to at least one of the four sides forming the outer periphery of the airbag. That is, by forming both the outer peripheral portion of the airbag and the inflatable hollow portion by the binding band of the hollow weave, it is possible to obtain an almost completed airbag only by the weaving process.

As a preferred embodiment of the present invention, at least one side of the bag fabric constituting the airbag body may be coated with a coating material for providing airtightness. By applying the covering material, the gas leak property of the airbag can be reduced, and the cushioning property can be maintained for a long time. The airbag of the present invention may be used as a knee bag that protects the knees of an occupant or a foot bag that protects the ankles of the occupant.

The airbag body of the present invention is formed of a hollow weave. Blanket is woven by a loom equipped with a jacquard device and a dobby device, and these devices are commonly used, for example, an electronic jacquard, a mechanical jacquard, a crank dobby, a positive dobby, a negative cam dobby, Select from high-speed depolarizing cam dobby, rotary dobby, etc. The loom may be selected from, for example, a shuttle loom, a water jet loom (WJL), an air jet loom (AJL), a rapier loom, and a projectile loom. The structure of the main body base fabric may be a plain weave, a weave (basket weave), a twill weave, a lattice weave (rip stop weave), or a composite design thereof. The woven structure of the inner knot forming the outer periphery and the hollow part of the bag fabric may be a plain weave, but a rough structure such as a ridge weave or a weave is used for the part adjacent to the knot, A plain weave may be used together on the outside. Furthermore, by using a third or fourth yarn different from the main yarns (first and second) constituting the two main body base fabrics, for example, a portion to which stress is easily applied when the main body base fabric is expanded, for example, It is also possible to reinforce the periphery of the outer peripheral corners and the periphery of the inflator attachment port, or to connect the main body base fabrics forming the inflating portions to each other in order to control the interval between the inflating portions, as a substitute for the hanging strap.

As the covering material used to improve the airtightness, those usually used for airbags for imparting mechanical reinforcement, heat resistance, airtightness, etc., for example,
Silicone resin or silicone rubber, polyurethane resin or polyurethane rubber (including silicone modified and fluorine modified), chlorine-containing rubber such as chloroprene rubber and hypalon rubber, fluorine rubber, and chlorine-based, polyester, polyamide, etc. resins on one side Alternatively, those applied on both sides may be used. The resin or rubber may be of any type such as solvent type, solventless type, water dispersion type and water soluble type.

These coating materials can be applied by 1) coating method (knife, kiss, reverse, comma, etc.),
Processing methods such as 2) dipping method, 3) printing method (screen, roll, rotary, etc.), 4) laminating method, etc. may be used, and the properties of the coating material are solvent type, emulsion type, aqueous solution type, fine powder. Any of a system type, a film type or a sheet type may be used. The applied amount is, for example, ^{20 to 1} per m ^2.
The thickness may be selected from the range of 00g or the thickness of 15 to 120 μm. Further, the coating material, various additives that are usually used for improving processability, adhesiveness, surface characteristics or durability, for example, a crosslinking agent, a reaction accelerator, a reaction retarder, a heat stabilizer, Antioxidants, light stabilizers, anti-aging agents, lubricants, leveling agents, anti-tacking agents, pigments, water repellents, oil repellents, masking agents such as titanium oxide, luster imparting agents, flame retardants, plasticizers, etc. One kind or two or more kinds may be selected and mixed. The covering material may be interposed on at least one surface of the main body base cloth, a gap portion of the base cloth, a gap between the fiber threads, or the like.

In addition, the coating material may be added with various pretreatment agents for improving the adhesion to the base cloth, an adhesion improver, or the like, or the surface of the base cloth may be pretreated with a primer treatment or the like in advance. May be. Further, in order to impart heat resistance, anti-aging property, oxidation resistance and the like to the elastomer, after applying the elastomer to the woven fabric, drying, crosslinking, vulcanization, etc. are treated with hot air, contact heat treatment, high energy treatment (high frequency, electronic Line, UV)
It's also good.

In the present invention, for joining other than the outer peripheral portion of the bag,
Means other than blanket, suturing, adhesion, welding, etc. may be used, but in the case of joining by stitching, for example, the sewing specifications are lock stitch,
The seams such as double chain stitches that are applied to ordinary airbags may be used. The sewing thread thickness is 630d.
(No. 20) to 2520d (No. 0), the number of hand movements is 2
It may be set to 10 needles / cm. When a plurality of rows of stitch lines are required, the distance between the stitches should be about 2 to 8 mm, and a multi-needle sewing machine may be used, but a single-needle sewing machine may be sewn multiple times. In some cases, an adhesive agent, a sealant, or the like may be applied and laminated on and / or under the seams, between the seams, and the seam margins in order to prevent gas escape from the seams.

The sewing thread used for suturing may be appropriately selected from those generally called synthetic fiber sewing threads and those used as industrial sewing threads. For example, nylon 6, nylon 66, nylon 46, polyester, vinylon,
There are aramid, carbon, glass, and the like, and any of spun yarn, filament composite twisted yarn, and filament resin processed yarn may be used.

Further, in the present invention, the opening for attaching the inflator may be opened by cutting, fusing or the like after the bag body is manufactured by the hollow weave, and the woven structure of the portion corresponding to the opening is preliminarily roughened. Break the thread,
It is sufficient to form the openings by dividing the threads of the relevant portion into four directions without forming the threads at all.

Further, depending on the characteristics of the inflator used, a heat-resistant protective cloth or a mechanical reinforcing cloth for protecting from the hot gas from the inflator may be provided. These protective cloth and reinforcing cloth, the cloth itself is a heat resistant material, for example, a wholly aromatic polyamide fiber, a wholly aromatic polyester fiber, a polyimide fiber, a heat-resistant fiber material such as fluorine-containing fiber may be used, A material in which a heat-resistant coating material is coated on a woven fabric which is the same as the bag body or which is thicker than the body fabric which is separately prepared may be used, or may be used without the coating material.

The fiber yarn constituting the main body base fabric of the present invention is not particularly limited, and for example, nylon 6,
Nylon 66, Nylon 46, Nylon 610, Nylon 612, etc., or aliphatic polyamide fibers obtained by copolymerization or mixing of these, and copolymerized polyamide of aliphatic amine and aromatic carboxylic acid represented by nylon 6T and nylon 9T Fiber, polyethylene terephthalate,
Polytrimethylene terephthalate, polybutylene terephthalate, polyethylene naphthalate, and the like, or polyester fibers obtained by copolymerization or mixture of these, paraphenylene terephthalamide, and aramid typified by copolymers of these with aromatic ethers. Fiber, wholly aromatic polyester fiber, vinylon fiber, ultra high molecular weight polyethylene fiber, fluorine fiber containing polytetrafluoroethylene, polysulfone fiber, polyphenylene sulfide fiber (PPS), polyether ether ketone (PEEK) fiber, polyimide (PI) fiber, polyetherimide (PEI) fiber, cellulosic fiber containing high-strength rayon, acrylic fiber, carbon fiber, glass fiber, silicone carbide (SiC) fiber, alumina fiber, etc. May be al optionally selected, in some cases, may include inorganic fibers such as metal fibers represented by steel. In these fiber yarns, various additives that are usually used for improving spinnability, processability, and durability of materials, for example, heat stabilizer, antioxidant, light stabilizer, antiaging agent, One or more kinds of lubricants, smoothing agents, pigments, water repellents, oil repellents, concealing agents such as titanium oxide, gloss imparting agents, flame retardants, plasticizers and the like may be used. Further, depending on the case, twisting, bulkiness processing, crimping processing, winding processing and the like may be performed. Furthermore, the form of the yarn is not particularly limited, such as filaments of long fibers, spun yarns of short fibers, and composite yarns thereof.

The specifications of the airbag according to the present invention may be selected according to the structure of the site where it is installed and applied, the space with the occupant, and the like, and the outer peripheral shape at the time of deployment is almost quadrilateral. In addition to pillow-shaped, box-shaped, diamond-shaped, trapezoidal-shaped ones having four sides, the case where the corners are not necessarily acute is also included. The bag capacity may also be appropriately selected according to the storage space, occupant impact absorption performance, inflator output, etc., and may be in the range of 2 to 20 liters, for example.

The inflator has a circular shape, an elliptical shape, an oval shape, a rectangular shape, depending on the shapes of the inflator and the mounting plate.
It is fixed to a mounting opening that opens in a polygonal shape, but for reinforcement at the mounting opening, a base cloth composed of threads of the same thickness as the main body base cloth or a base cloth composed of threads thinner than the main body base cloth, etc. One or a plurality of sheets may be used by sewing or the like. In some cases, these base cloths may be coated with a heat resistant material such as silicone resin / rubber, urethane resin / rubber, or the like. Further, in order to absorb energy when the occupant's knees or ankles come into contact with the bag, one or a plurality of exhaust holes, for example, a circular hole having a diameter of 5 mm to 25 mm or a hole having an area equivalent thereto may be provided. A reinforcing cloth may be bonded to the periphery. Further, in order to control the thickness of the bag when inflated, a hanging string, an adjustment cloth or the like may be provided inside.

The folding method for storing the bag is also roll folding, bellows folding, folding folding, or a combination thereof, or folding folding symmetrical with respect to the center such as a driver's seat bag, and a side bag with a built-in seat. You can fold it with an alligator fold like that. The airbag of the present invention is used as a bag body that replaces a conventionally used high-rigidity shock absorbing plate, but the bag body may be inflated alone, or the bag body and the shock absorbing plate are connected to each other to expand. It may be used as a structure in which the bag body pushes out the shock absorber.

The present invention relates to the lower body legs of the occupant, particularly the knees,
The purpose is to obtain a robust bag for protecting the ankle, etc., but for applications other than these protection parts, such as side bags with built-in seats, headrest bags for rear-end collision protection, foot bags, infant protection (Child seats) mini bags, air belt bags, passenger cars, trucks, buses, motorcycles, etc., but also ships, trains, airplanes, amusement park facilities, etc. It may be applied to various purposes.

[0025]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Hereinafter, the present invention will be described more specifically based on Examples. In addition, in the examples, the performance evaluation of the airbag was performed by the following method. (1) Bursting strength Bursting strength was measured by a bursting tester for air bags (Hodogaya Giken Co., Ltd.). (2) Along the long side of the quadrilateral of the storable airbag, each long side is symmetrically accordionly bent inward once and bent outward once twice.
Both bends were aligned at the second fold line, and similarly, the short side was folded twice in a bellows shape, and both bends were aligned on the center line at the second fold line. Then, a metal plate having a thickness of 1 mm and a size of 15 cm × 15 cm on which a load of 1 kg was placed was placed on the bag, and the bag thickness after 1 minute was measured, and Example 1 was expressed as a relative value of 100.

EXAMPLE 1 Nylon 66 fiber 700d was used as the airbag fabric base fabric.
Using a tex / 108f (original yarn strength of 8.5 cN / dtex) yarn and a rapier loom with a jacquard device, the outer circumference shown in FIG. 1 is almost rectangular (length 20 cm, width 30 cm).
Thus, a plain weave bag fabric having a weave density of 43.5 warps / inch and 44 wefts was prepared. The width of the joint portion of the outer peripheral portion was 2 cm, the four corner portions were circular with a radius of 6 cm, and the binding bands (two portions) provided on the inflating portion of the bag were 6 cm in length and 2 cm in width. This woven fabric is refined and heat-set, and then an addition type thermosetting silicone resin is applied at 80 g / m ² (solid component conversion), and 1
It was dried at 20 ° C. and heat-treated at 160 ° C. The fabric density after coating was 45 yarns / inch for both warp and weft. A bag is cut from this coated woven fabric along the outer peripheral joint, and a diameter of 6 cm is provided in the center of one main body base cloth of the bag.
Circular opening with diameter 2c at the top of this opening
One m exhaust hole is provided. 6 cm inner diameter and 1 outer diameter from plain woven cloth woven side by side with the jacquard loom
A piece of 2 cm doughnut-shaped cloth was cut, and the cut pieces were laminated with silicone resin surfaces on top of the central opening and bonded and fixed with a room temperature curable silicone adhesive. The characteristics of the obtained airbag were evaluated. The burst strength was high, and the foldability was not a problem.

Example 2 470 dtex / 72f (base yarn strength 8.
Example 1 except that a bag fabric made of 5 cN / dtex) and having a warp and weft weave density of 51 yarns / inch was used.
An airbag was prepared according to the above. The characteristics of the obtained airbag were evaluated. As shown in Table 1, the foldability was extremely good although the burst strength was slightly low.

Comparative Example 1 Except that a bag fabric made of 1400 dtex / 210f (original yarn strength 8.0 cN / dtex) yarn having a warp and weft woven density of 20 yarns / inch was used as the main body base fabric. An airbag was prepared according to Example 1. Although the obtained airbag has high burst strength, it is inferior in foldability and is not satisfactory as the leg protecting airbag of the present invention.

[0029]

[Table 1]

As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to obtain a leg protecting airbag which can withstand a shock at the time of deployment and a high internal pressure of the bag when the legs of an occupant come into contact with it and can be stored compactly. it can.

[0030]

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an explanatory view of an airbag of the present invention as viewed from the front before deployment.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken along line AA of FIG.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory view of the airbag of another embodiment of the present invention as seen from the front before deployment.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory view of an airbag according to still another embodiment of the present invention as seen from the front before deployment.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory view of an airbag according to still another embodiment of the present invention as seen from the front before deployment.

[Explanation of symbols]

1, 21, 31, 41 Air bag body bag fabrics 2, 22, 32, 42 Air bag hollow portions 3, 23, 33, 43 Peripheral joints 4a, 4b; 24a, 24b; 34a, 34b; 44
a, 44b Bonding band 5, 6 Main body base cloth

   ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continued front page    F-term (reference) 3D054 AA02 AA03 AA06 AA07 AA08                       AA25 CC04 CC15 CC26 CC27                       CC35 CC36 CC45                 4L033 AA07 AA08 AB05 AC15 CA14                       CA18 CA45 CA50 CA55 CA59                       CA68                 4L048 AA20 AA21 AA34 AA48 AA49                       AB11 AC09 AC10 BA13 CA01                       CA02 CA11 CA15 DA25

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. An airbag formed by joining two main body base fabrics in a bag shape, wherein the outer periphery of the airbag is joined in a substantially quadrilateral shape by a hollow weave, and the hollow weave fabric is 950 decitex or less. An airbag using the above yarn, and the cover factor of the main body fabric is 1700 or more. 2. The inflating portion of the airbag comprises a plurality of hollow portions formed by a binding band of a hollow weave provided substantially parallel to at least one of the four sides forming the outer periphery of the airbag. The airbag according to claim 1. 3. The airbag according to claim 1, wherein at least one surface of the airbag is provided with a coating material for providing airtightness. 4. The airbag according to claim 1, wherein the airbag is a knee bag that protects the knees of an occupant. 5. The airbag according to claim 1, wherein the airbag is a footbag that protects ankles of an occupant.