Crashworthiness improvement of vehicle-to-rigid fixed barrier in full frontal impact using novel vehicle's front-end structures

There are different types of vehicle impacts recorded every year, resulting in many injuries and fatalities. The severity of these impacts depends on the aggressively and incompatibility of vehicle-to-roadside hardware impacts. The aim of this paper is to investigate and to enhance crashworthiness in the case of full barrier impact using a new idea of crash improvement. Two different types of smart structures have been proposed to support the function of the existing vehicle. The work carried out in this paper includes developing and analyzing mathematical models of vehicle-to-barrier impact for the two types of smart structures. It is proven from analytical analysis that the mathematical models can be used in an effective way to give a quick insight of real life crashes. Moreover, it is shown that these models are valid and flexible, and can be useful in optimization studies.