JPH0789402A - Folding structure of air bag - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To increase the appearance quality of an entire steering wheel by forming a square folded part, connected to a triangular folded part, and increasing the number of folded layers on the square folded part more than that on the triangular folded part. CONSTITUTION:A part where an air bag 1 is overlapped is 6-layer at the upper side and 4-layer at the lower triangle part 1c. The lower triangle part 1c is most twisted at the right angle top and, in actual, its thickness becomes 4-layer or more. First the thickness of the air bag 1 after folding becomes mostly even. Second the air bag 1 of flat circular form can be folded in pentagonal form 1beta. By these two actions, when the air bag 1 is stored under the pad 16 of an air bag device 100, the air bag device 100 is prevented from becoming large and the pad 16 can be made in pentagonal form. becoming large and the pad 16 can be made in pentagonal form. Thus, when the air bag device 100 is installed on a three-spoke steering 12, the appearance quality of the entire steering wheel 12 is increased.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an airbag folding structure in an airbag device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a conventional airbag folding structure, as shown in Japanese Utility Model Laid-Open No. 103853/1993, the airbag is folded into a trapezoidal shape 20 which is almost rectangular, as shown in FIG. is there. When the trapezoidal airbag is stored inside the pad 21 of the airbag device, the pad 21 itself must be trapezoidal. Therefore, when such a trapezoidal air bag device having a shape close to a rectangle is attached to the steering wheel, there is a possibility that the field of view from the passenger side to the instrument panel may be narrowed. Further, conventionally, when such a pad shape is used, there is no choice but to use four spokes, there is no freedom in selecting the steering shape, and it is difficult to improve the appearance quality.

Here, in order to improve the appearance quality seen from the occupant side of the steering wheel, a method in which an airbag can be folded in a pad of the steering wheel having three spokes is disclosed in, for example, Japanese Utility Model Laid-Open No. 4-137953. Is disclosed in. This is a method in which two vertices on the same side, which are the corners of a trapezoidal shape close to a rectangle, are folded in the folded state of the airbag.

[0004]

However, in the above method, the specific portion of the airbag after folding becomes thicker,
Therefore, there is a problem that the thickness of the entire airbag device increases and the airbag device becomes large. Therefore, the present invention, when mounting the airbag device to the steering wheel,
An object of the present invention is to prevent the occupant from observing the instrument panel while suppressing the increase in size of the airbag device due to the thickness of the airbag and improving the overall appearance of the steering wheel.

[0005]

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention is a folding structure of an airbag which bulges toward the occupant side in the event of a vehicle collision, and the left and right side portions are folded a plurality of times to form a substantially rectangular shape. After the strip-shaped body is formed, a triangular folded portion is formed on at least one end side in the longitudinal direction of the strip so as to have a vertex in a central axis parallel to the longitudinal direction of the strip, and the triangular shape is formed. Of the air bag characterized in that the number of folding layers of the rectangular folding part is larger than the number of folding layers of the triangular folding part. Adopts a folding structure.

[0006]

According to the present invention, by folding at least one end side in the longitudinal direction of the belt-shaped body into a triangular shape, it becomes easy to store the airbag in the pad of the three-spoke steering wheel. Further, when the airbag is folded, if the same number of layers are overlapped in the triangular portion and the quadrangular portion, the triangular portion is more difficult to fold than the quadrangular portion, so the triangular portion can be thicker. However, it is possible to fold the airbag to a uniform thickness by making the number of the folding layers of the rectangular folding portion larger than the number of the triangular folding portions.

[0007]

The present invention will be described below with reference to the embodiments shown in the drawings. A case in which the airbag 1β folded according to the folding structure of the airbag of the present invention is applied to the airbag device 100 which is an occupant protection device will be described with reference to FIGS. 13 and 14.

As shown in FIG. 13, the airbag device 100 attached to the steering wheel 12 accommodates an airbag 1β which is inflated to protect an occupant in a vehicle collision and which is folded by a method described later. . Each sensor that detects a vehicle collision is mounted in the electronic control unit 13, and the electronic control unit 13 takes in the detection signal. Then, the collision determination is performed based on the fetched detection signal, and when the collision is determined, the inflator 14 is operated. As a result, gas is injected into the airbag 1β from the gas ejection holes 15 and the airbag 1β is inflated.

1 to 12, the folding structure of the airbag when the thickness of the airbag is taken into consideration will be described in detail. As shown in FIGS. 6 to 12, first, the airbag 1 is first changed from the plane circular state to the left part 1e and the right part 1f so as to be positioned on the left and right sides of the center line y of the airbag 1, respectively.
1 and 2 are separately folded on the left and right sides (FIGS. 7 to 11).
The strip 1α as shown in FIG.

Next, FIGS. 1 to 5 show the progress of folding the belt-shaped body 1α obtained by folding the airbag 1 by the above method into a pentagonal shape. However, in FIGS. 1 to 5, (a) is a front view and (b) is a side view. As for the strip 1α of the airbag 1 folded as shown in FIGS. 1 (a) and 1 (b), 1a is located about 1/7 of the diameter of the airbag 1 from the center line x as shown in FIG. 2 (a). Side position and center line y
And the folded portion 1a which is folded back to the side so that the center line z of the folded portion 1a of the strip 1α is orthogonal to each other, and is further folded back.
As shown in FIG. 3A, the side is folded back so that the center line y and the center line z overlap each other. As a result, the lower triangular portion 1c is twisted once.

Further, as shown in FIG. 4 (a), the upper piece 1d side is folded back downward at a position above the center line x by about 1/5 of the diameter. Finally, as shown in FIG. 5A, the upper piece 1a side is folded back to the lower side at a position about 1/11 of the diameter above the center line x. The following is a general method of limiting the folding position of the folded portion 1a when the thickness is not taken into consideration.

The width of the strip 1α is a and the length of the long piece is ka. Then, the length of the portion where the folded portion 1a and the strip 1α completely overlap is

[0013]

[Expression 1] [a (k-1) -z] Therefore, if the length of the strip 1α up to the folded position is z, z is

[0014]

## EQU2 ## It is expressed as z = 2. (K-1) .a / 3. By referring to the folding position set by the above method, the airbag with any diameter has four triangular folding layers and six square folding layers. It can be folded into

The operation of the above configuration will be described below.
As shown in FIG. 5B, the overlapping portion of the airbag 1 has six layers on the upper side and four layers on the lower triangular portion 1c. However, in the lower triangular portion 1c, the twist is most severe at the right-angled vertex, and actually the thickness is four layers or more. As a result, first, the thickness of the airbag 1 after folding is as uniform as possible. That is, the thickness of the airbag 1 can be suppressed when the airbag 1 is folded into a certain shape. Secondly, as shown in FIG. 5, the planar circular airbag 1 can be folded into a pentagonal 1β. Due to the above two actions, when the airbag 1 is stored under the pad 16 of the airbag device 100, it is possible to prevent the airbag device 100 from becoming large, and to make the pad 16 into a pentagonal shape. You can Therefore, as shown in FIG. 14, when the airbag device 100 is mounted on the three-spoke steering wheel 12, the appearance quality of the entire steering wheel 12 is improved. Further, as shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, by twisting the strip 1α, the shape retention after folding is also improved. Accordingly, the labor required for assembling the airbag device 100 can be reduced.

Performance tests were carried out after the airbag was folded by the folding structure of the present invention, but it was confirmed that there was no problem in performance such as deployment shape and deployment time. The present invention is not limited to the above embodiment, but can be variously modified as follows.

For example, the method of folding the airbag from the circular flat state into the belt-like body is not limited to the method shown in FIGS. 6 to 12 described above, but may be folded by the method shown in FIGS. 17 to 23. This method is the center line y of the airbag 2.
The left portion 2d and the right portion 2c are folded at the same time in parallel with. Further, a method of folding the belt-like body into a pentagonal shape by the method shown in FIGS. 24 to 28 may be adopted. However,
24 to 25, (a) represents a front view,
(B) represents a side view.

First, as shown in FIG. 25, the band-shaped body 3α is folded back at a position of about ⅓ of the diameter of the airbag so that the center lines y overlap each other. Next, as shown in FIG. 26, the two vertices 3b and 3c of the overlapping strips are folded so as to be in contact with each other on the center line y. The method of folding the strip 3α shown in FIGS. 27 and 28 below is as described with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5.

[0019]

As described above, according to the present invention, since it becomes easy to store the airbag in the pad of the steering of the three-spoke, when the airbag device is attached to the steering wheel, the three-spoke of the three-spoke is used. It can be attached to the steering wheel, and the overall appearance quality of the steering wheel can be improved.

Further, by folding the airbag into a uniform thickness, it can be folded most compactly in a certain folded state. As a result, it is possible to suppress an increase in the size of the airbag device due to the thickness of the airbag, and it is possible to further improve the appearance quality of the entire steering while ensuring the visibility of the instrument panel from the occupant side.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an airbag folded into a band.

FIG. 2 is a progress diagram when an airbag folded into a strip is folded into a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 3 is a progress diagram when an airbag folded into a strip is folded into a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 4 is a progress diagram when an airbag folded into a strip is folded into a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an airbag folded in a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing a process of folding the airbag into a band.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a process of folding the airbag into a strip.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a process of folding the airbag into a belt-shaped body.

FIG. 9 is a diagram showing a process of folding the airbag into a belt-shaped body.

FIG. 10 is a diagram showing a process of folding the airbag into a band.

FIG. 11 is a diagram showing a process when the airbag is folded into a band.

FIG. 12 is a diagram showing a process of folding the airbag into a belt-shaped body.

FIG. 13 is a cross-sectional view showing the overall configuration of an airbag device.

FIG. 14 is a front view showing the appearance of the three-spoke steering wheel with the airbag device mounted, as viewed from the occupant side.

FIG. 15 is a diagram showing a folded state of an airbag according to a conventional example.

FIG. 16 is a diagram showing an external appearance viewed from an occupant side when an airbag device using the airbag of FIG. 15 is attached to a three-spoke type steering wheel.

FIG. 17 is a diagram showing the progress of another method of folding the airbag into.

FIG. 18 is a diagram showing the progress of another method of folding the airbag into.

FIG. 19 is a diagram showing the progress of another method of folding the airbag into

FIG. 20 is a diagram showing the progress of another method of folding the airbag into.

FIG. 21 is a diagram showing the progress of another method of folding the airbag into.

FIG. 22 is a diagram showing the progress of another method of folding the airbag into.

FIG. 23 is a diagram showing the progress of another method of folding the airbag into.

FIG. 24 is a diagram showing the progress of an example of another method of folding a strip in a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 25 is a diagram showing the progress of an example of another method of folding a strip in a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 26 is a diagram showing the progress of an example of another method of folding a strip in a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 27 is a diagram showing the progress of an example of another method of folding a strip into a pentagonal shape.

FIG. 28 is a diagram showing the progress of an example of another method of folding a strip in a pentagonal shape.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Airbag 1α Airbag folded into a strip 1β Airbag folded into a pentagon

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A folding structure of an airbag that bulges toward an occupant side when a vehicle collides, and the left and right side portions are folded a plurality of times to form a substantially rectangular belt-like body, and then the longitudinal direction of the belt-like body is set. A triangular fold is formed on at least one end side in the longitudinal direction of the strip so as to have vertices in parallel central axes, and a rectangular fold is formed in series with the triangular fold. The folding structure for an airbag, wherein the number of folding layers of the rectangular folding portion is larger than the number of folding layers of the triangular folding portion.