JP3845419B2 - Impact energy absorber - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an impact energy absorbing material that absorbs energy of external force applied to the body of an automobile.

In order to ensure the safety of automobiles, body panels such as outer panels and inner panels have been reinforced. To reinforce the body panel, the panel thickness can be increased, but the weight of the vehicle body tends to increase as the thickness increases, resulting in higher material costs and higher production costs. Will also reduce fuel consumption. For this reason, the body panel is designed with consideration given to the panel strength and the like, while taking into account the curvature and thickness of the panel.
Shoko Sho 46-23533

However, there are cases where the body of an automobile has a different shape, thickness of the body, etc. depending on the type of vehicle, or because the accessory parts of the automobile are arranged, the panel cannot be reinforced. Therefore, in order to satisfy the weight reduction while strengthening the body, some kind of reinforcing member is required. In addition, even if the body is sufficiently strengthened by design, there is a case where it is desired to further strengthen the body by a simple method so that the weight is not further increased.
On the other hand, when an external force exceeding a certain level is applied to the body of the automobile, plastic deformation occurs in the body panel. In such a case, if there is an absorbent material that can absorb the energy of the external force, the burden on the vehicle occupant and damage to other components due to the external force can be reduced.
The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide an impact energy absorbing material that can absorb the energy of an external force applied to the body without significantly increasing the weight of the automobile.

  In order to achieve the above purpose, hard aluminum plate material is layered in two layers, and on both the front and back surfaces, inner layer material and outer layer material made of kraft paper are layered to form a pipe, and uneven portions are formed in a spiral around the pipe. However, when this flexible pipe is formed into a quadrangular cross section, this flexible pipe is attached to the body of an automobile and an external force is applied to the cross section of the flexible pipe. Thus, the amount of deformation of the cross section is small, and when a load of a certain level or more is applied, the deformation of the cross section is plastically deformed so that the amount of external force is absorbed.

  As described above, according to the present invention, two layers of hard aluminum plate materials are stacked, and pipes are formed by stacking inner layer materials and outer layer materials made of kraft paper on both front and back surfaces, and uneven portions are formed around them. This flexible pipe has a rectangular cross-sectional shape and is attached to the body of an automobile so that the external force applied to the body can be increased without increasing the weight of the automobile. Energy can be absorbed, and the burden on the occupant due to the external force and damage to other components can be reduced.

Hereinafter, impact energy absorbing materials according to embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
1 to 3 show an impact energy absorbing material 1 according to the present invention. This energy absorbing material 1 is a pipe having a flexible shape with a substantially rectangular cross section. As for the quadrangular shape, either a square shape or a rectangular shape can be used. In this embodiment, a square shape is used as shown in FIG. There are pipes of various sizes suitable for the use condition.

  FIG. 4 is an enlarged view of an X portion of the energy absorbing material 1 in FIG. As shown in the drawing, the surface shape of the energy absorbing material 1 is a polymer composed of three layers of an outer layer material 2, an intermediate layer material 3, and an inner layer material 4 in order from the outside. Among these, the outer layer material 2 and the inner layer material 4 use kraft paper, and the intermediate layer material 3 uses hard aluminum. Then, in these layer materials 2 to 4, the concave portions 5 and the convex portions 6 are formed in a continuous wave shape in the axial direction of the energy absorbing material 1, and the concave and convex portions 5 and 6 are shown in FIGS. 1 and 3. Thus, it is formed in a spiral shape. Table 1 shows details of a preferable shape as the energy absorbing material 1.

Next, the characteristics of the impact energy absorbing material 1 will be described.
5A shows a rectangular impact energy absorbing material 1 according to the present embodiment, and FIG. 5B shows an impact energy absorbing material 10 having a circular cross section in a comparative example. The circular energy absorbing material 10 is a pipe having flexibility with a perfect cross section, the outer diameter is the same as the external width of one side of the rectangular energy absorbing material 1, the axial length, other intermediate layer materials, etc. The wall thickness, spiral pitch and number of turns are the same.

  These energy absorbing materials 1 and 10 were compressed with a compression tester at the tip of a hemisphere 11 having a diameter of 165 mm, and the length L of the inner diameter in FIG. 2 was measured. The compression speed is 100 mm / min. The result is shown in FIG. In the figure, a solid line a indicates the test result of the rectangular energy absorber 1, and a solid line b indicates a circular energy absorber. As is apparent from the figure, the rectangular energy absorbing material 1 has a small deformation amount with respect to a high load from the initial state as compared with a circular one, and absorbs energy from an external force at the initial stage of deformation. When a load exceeding a certain level is applied, the amount of deformation increases rapidly. The other circular energy absorbing material 10 is a linear diagram in which the load and the deformation amount are proportional.

  Table 2 shows the details of the shapes of the energy absorbing materials of different types. As a result of the above test for these energy absorbing materials, Type 1 is bottomed (the length L of the internal width is 0). The load was about 220 kgf and type 2 was 460 kgf. Type 2 is a hard aluminum plate material in which a hard aluminum plate material having a thickness of 0.1 mm and a width of 35 mm is stacked in two layers.

  About the intensity | strength of the impact energy absorption material 1, the deformation amount with respect to a load can be changed by providing roundness in a corner | angular part, and the deformation amount with respect to a load becomes large, so that the radius of roundness becomes large. Furthermore, tuning is possible by changing the thickness, width, and pitch of the convex portions of the material.

  The energy absorbing material 1 absorbs energy of an external force when an external force is applied to the body of the automobile. As shown in FIG. 7, the energy absorber 1 is disposed at the front pillar 12, the center pillar 13, the shoulder portions 14 and 15 of the front and rear doors, the waist portions 16 and 17, the front roof rail 18, and the side roof rail 19. When a slidey groove is attached to the rear header rail 20 or the like, it can be arranged around the slidey groove 21.

Since the energy absorbing material 1 is rectangular, it can be directly attached to the panel with an adhesive. Moreover, since the energy absorbing material 1 has flexibility, even if there is a slight curve in the installation location, it can be attached correspondingly.
As described above, when the external force is applied to the body of the automobile 11, the energy absorbing material according to the embodiment of the present invention absorbs the energy of the external force due to the deformation of the energy absorbing material 1, and the load applied to other parts. And shock can be reduced. In particular, the impact can be reduced with a small amount of deformation even when a large initial load is applied as compared with a circular cross section.
In addition, it has versatility such that it can be mounted even if there is some curvature, and the mounting workability is good. As shown in Table 1, the weight is light, and the weight of the vehicle body is not burdened.

  The embodiment of the present invention has been described above. Of course, the present invention is not limited to this, and various modifications can be made based on the technical idea of the present invention.

For example, according to the above embodiment, the energy absorbing material 1 is disposed at a position as shown in FIG. 7, but the mounting position of the energy absorbing material 1 is not limited to those locations, for example, an apron side panel in an engine room, It can be placed on the front panel and the like, and has the same effect.
Moreover, about the energy absorption material 1, although the uneven | corrugated | grooved parts 5 and 6 were formed in a spiral shape in order to make this flexible, you may make it have flexibility by arranging an uneven | corrugated | grooved part in cyclic | annular form.
When attaching the energy absorbing material 1 to each part, not only a method of attaching with an adhesive, but also a clip may be attached to the energy absorbing material 1 and attached to the panel, or may be attached by a clip band.

It is a perspective view which shows one embodiment of the impact energy absorption material of this invention. It is the same front view. It is the partially broken side view. It is an expanded sectional view of the arrow X part of FIG. A is a characteristic test schematic diagram of an impact energy absorbing material according to an embodiment of the present invention. B is a schematic diagram of a characteristic test of the impact energy absorbing material of the comparative example. It is a schematic graph which shows the result of a characteristic test. It is a perspective view of the automobile which showed the place where the impact energy absorption material by this embodiment is arranged.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Impact energy absorption material 2 Outer layer material 3 Middle layer material 4 Inner layer material 5 Concave part 6 Convex part 11 Automobile

Claims (12)

Two layers of hard aluminum sheets are stacked, and on both the front and back surfaces, an inner layer material and an outer layer material made of kraft paper are overlapped to form a pipe, and an uneven portion is formed in a spiral around the pipe. When the flexible pipe is attached to the body of an automobile and an external force is applied to the cross section of the flexible pipe, the amount of deformation of the above cross section with respect to a high load in the initial state is formed. An impact energy absorbing material characterized in that the energy of external force is absorbed by plastic deformation so that the amount of deformation of the cross section increases rapidly when a load exceeding a certain level is applied. The impact energy absorbing material according to claim 1, wherein the concave and convex portions of the flexible pipe are arranged in an annular shape. The impact energy absorbing material according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the flexible pipe is curved and disposed. The impact energy absorbing material according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the flexible pipe is attached to the body with an adhesive or a fastening member. The impact energy absorbing material according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the body is a front pillar. The impact energy absorbing material according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the body is a center pillar. The impact energy absorbing material according to claim 1, wherein the body is a shoulder portion of a front door. The impact energy absorbing material according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the body is a shoulder portion of a rear door. The impact energy absorbing material according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the body is a front roof rail. The impact energy absorbing material according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the body is a side roof rail. The impact energy absorbing material according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the body is a rear header roof. The impact energy absorber according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the body is around a sliding roof.

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