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Introduction
Henry Ford revolutionized the world in the 1920s by using an assembly line technique to produce cars that everyone could afford. His "Model T" prototype spawned a new era in which personal freedom and independence was expressed through the ownership and usage of an automobile. The Model T was simple in design and function by today's standards; it did not accelerate nor brake quickly and did not handle very well. In fact, it had a permanent convertible-style top that offered no shelter from weather, and it did not have safety belts or other constraining devices. Shortly after its creation, Ford stated, "There is no need for further development in motorcars, for I have perfected the modern automobile." Little did Ford realize that he had pioneered a machine that would undergo decades of technological safety revisions.

Years after the Model T was assembled, the seat belt was implemented in some cars as the only form of passive restraint. People were reluctant to use the belts at first, claiming that they were uncomfortable and restricted movement in the car. However, statistics have proven that seat belts are responsible for saving lives in automobile accidents that would have otherwise been lost. Most regions in the United States and many other countries now enforce mandatory safety belt laws. Although airbags have never replaced seatbelts, they were designed to provide maximum safety when used in combination with seatbelts. It is important that they be used at the same time as safety belts because most airbags only work in front end collisions faster than 10 miles per hour. Regardless, airbag technology is currently undergoing innovative revisions and improvements at a phenomenal rate, while seatbelt design has remained stable throughout the years. This article will explore the historical development of airbags, explain the engineering behind the airbag's deployment technology, safety concerns and the future of airbags.

I Airbags Historical Development Of Airbags

Airbags have been under development for many years. Their purpose is to restrain automobile drivers and passengers in a collision, whether or not they are wearing seat belts. Early airbags were mainly used as inflatable crash landing devices for airplanes. The first patent on an airbag was filed during World War II, and the automobile industry started researching airbag technologies in the late 1950s. The early airbag designs were impractical and expensive. The main concern for design engineers was for the storing and releasing of a compressed gas. Issues were raised such as where to store the container for gas in the car, how to develop a mechanism that allows the gas to expand quickly, and how to make sure that the stored gas would have a shelf life at least equal to that of the car. In addition, the automobile industry found that in order to be effective, an airbag must deploy and inflate within 40 milliseconds. The airbag systems must also be able to differentiate between major and minor collisions. These issues were addressed in the 1970s with the invention of small propellant "inflators," devices that initiate a chemical reaction that releases hot nitrogen gas into the airbag. This device was a major stepping-stone in the development of airbag technology, as it has enabled the common use of commercial airbag systems that have been available since the late 1980s

The Basics
Before looking at specifics, let's review our knowledge of the laws of motion. First, we know that moving objects have momentum (the product of the mass and the velocity of an object). Unless an outside force acts on an object, the object will continue to move at its present speed and direction. Cars consist of several objects, including the vehicle itself, loose objects in the car and, of course, passengers. If these objects are not restrained, they will continue moving at whatever speed the car is traveling at, even if the car is stopped by a collision.

3 Stopping an object's momentum requires force acting over a period of time. When a car crashes, the force required to stop an object is very great because the car's momentum has changed instantly while the passengers' has not -- there is not much time to work with. The goal of any supplemental restraint system is to help stop the passenger while doing as little damage to him or her as possible. What an air bag wants to do is to slow the passenger's speed to zero with little or no damage. The constraints that it has to work within are huge. The air bag has the space between the passenger and the steering wheel or dash board and a fraction of a second to work with. Even that tiny amount of space and time is valuable, however, if the system can slow the passenger evenly rather than forcing an abrupt halt to his or her motion. There are three parts to an air bag that help to accomplish this feat:

The bag itself is made of a thin, nylon fabric, which is folded into the steering wheel or dashboard or, more recently, the seat or door. The sensor is the device that tells the bag to inflate. Inflation happens when there is a collision force equal to running into a brick wall at 10 to 15 miles per hour (16 to 24 km per hour). A mechanical switch is flipped when there is a mass shift that closes an electrical contact, telling the sensors that a crash has occurred. The sensors receive information from an accelerometer built into a microchip.

The air bag's inflation system reacts sodium azide (NaN ) with potassium nitrate
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(KNO ) to produce nitrogen gas. Hot blasts of the nitrogen inflate the air bag.
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The air bag and inflation system stored in the steering wheel

The inflation system is not unlike a solid rocket booster. The air bag system ignites a solid propellant, which burns extremely rapidly to create a large volume of gas to inflate the bag. The bag then literally bursts from its storage site at up to 200 mph (322 kph) faster than the blink of an eye! A second later, the gas quickly dissipates through tiny holes in the bag, thus deflating the bag so you can move. Even though the whole process happens in only one-twenty-fifth of a second, the additional time is enough to help prevent serious injury. The powdery substance released from the air bag, by the way, is regular cornstarch or talcum powder, which is used by the air bag manufacturers to keep the bags pliable and lubricated while they're in storage.

Safety And The Future Of Airbags

Crash studies by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) show that airbags reduced death fatalities in a direct frontal crash by about 30 percent. The NHTSA also estimates that airbags prevented about 600 fatalities in 1995 alone. The increasing trend towards requiring airbags in all new cars reflects the public's better realization of the airbag's benefits. As more new cars come standardized with airbags, the rate of deaths in high-speed accidents will

6 decrease. Although there seems to be a beneficial correlation between airbag use and lives saved in accidents, there are rare cases where the airbag's deployment kills or seriously injures people in the car. Usually occurring in low-speed accidents, the airbag can deploy and cause more damage to the passenger than had it not deployed. These exceptions to the rule have inspired an ethical dilemma that questions the usefulness and "safety" of airbags. Do the benefits of airbags outnumber the disadvantages? According to a study, deaths among drivers using both airbags and seat belts are 26% lower than among drivers using seat belts alone (Casiday, Frey). In spite of these optimistic findings, safety advocates continue to evoke the same controversy that surrounded seat belt use in its early years, and airbags are now the subject of serious government and industry research. In spite of the controversy surrounding airbag safety, car manufacturers continue installing airbags on both driver and passenger sides, both of which has been required since the 1998 model year. In addition, side- and rear-mounted airbags are being developed and used in cars. Head airbags are the newest innovation, and were first made available on all 1999 models of BMW cars. Using the same technology as steering wheel airbag technology, the sausage-shaped bags are located on the seat's headrest and are supposed to offer greater protection from side collisions and rollovers. Some experts say that within the next few years, our cars will go from dual airbags to having half dozen airbags. These cars will undoubtedly reflect the improved safety features in the price tag, but are consumers willing to pay more for an extra measure of safety?

Airbags have also been used in spacecraft. In 1997, NASA installed a $5 million airbag on its Pathfinder spacecraft, which was the first spacecraft to reach Mars since the 1970s. The airbags cushioned a "crash landing" on the planet at a collision speed of approximately 65 miles per hour.

Engineers continue designing airbags that might better protect automobile passengers as they also explore ways to make the devices smaller. Hopefully, these advancements will be available at affordable prices for everybody. With the advent of digital technology, the possibilities of safety provisions are endless. But there is a warning: no matter how many airbags in your car, you still need to wear a seat belt.

Recent Development
Volvo engineers experimented with different ways of mounting side air bags and chose seat-back installation because that protects passengers of all sizes regardless of how the seat is positioned. This arrangement allows them to place a triggering mechanical sensor on the sides of the seat cushions under the driver and front passenger. This prevents the air bag on the undamaged side of the car from inflating. Installing the entire air bag package in the seat-back also offers the advantage of preventing unnecessary deployments that might be caused by collisions with pedestrians or bicycles. It takes a collision of about 12 mph (19 kph) to trigger side air bags.

8 BMW engineers have chosen door-mounted air bags. The door has more space, allowing for a bigger bag that provides more coverage. Also under development is the head air bag, or Inflatable Tubular Structure (ITS), which was featured in all of BMW's 1999 models (except convertibles). The head bags look a little like big sausages and, unlike other air bags, are designed to stay inflated for about 5 seconds to offer protection against second or third impacts. Working with the side air bag, the ITS is supposed to offer better protection in some side collisions.

II A.B.S. The History Of A.B.S.

When a driver of a vehicle hits conventional brakes hard, the wheels may lock causing the vehicle to skid, especially on wet and slippery roads. Antilock brake systems provide the capability for shorter stopping distances and the ability to steer and to maintain control during hard braking, especially on wet and slippery surfaces. Antilocks were first used on airplanes beginning in the 1950s and have been used extensively on large trucks in European countries since the early 1980s. However, antilock brake systems have only recently become widely available in cars; the first cars to have electronic antilock brake systems as standard equipment were the 1985 Mercedes-Benz S-class models. Front- and rear-wheel antilocks were available as standard or optional equipment on about 30 domestic and foreign car models by the 1987 model year. About 18% of new cars sold in the 1991 model year had antilocks, 32% in the 1992 model year had them, and manufacturers' projections indicate the percentage will continue to grow.

Getting The A.B.S. Concept

The theory behind anti-lock brakes is simple. A skidding wheel (where the tire contact patch is sliding relative to the road) has less traction than a non-skidding wheel.If you have been stuck on ice, you know that if your wheels are spinning you have no traction.This is because the contact patch is sliding relative to the ice.By keeping the wheels from skidding while you slow down, anti-lock brakes benefit you in two ways:You'll stop faster and you'll be able to steer while u stop

Inside A.B.S.
There are four main components to an ABS system:

Speed sensors Pump Valves Controller

10 Speed Sensors The anti-lock braking system needs some way of knowing when a wheel is about to lock up. The speed sensors, which are located at each wheel, or in some cases in the differential, provide this information. Valves There is a valve in the brake line of each brake controlled by the ABS. On some systems, the valve has three positions:

In position one, the valve is open; pressure from the master cylinder is passed right through to the brake. In position two, the valve blocks the line, isolating that brake from the master cylinder. This prevents the pressure from rising further should the driver push the brake pedal harder.

In position three, the valve releases some of the pressure from the brake.

Pump Since the valve is able to release pressure from the brakes, there has to be some way to put that pressure back. That is what the pump does; when a valve reduces the pressure in a line, the pump is there to get the pressure back up. Controller The controller is a computer in the car. It watches the speed sensors and controls the valves.

A.B.S. At Work
There are many different variations and control algorithms for ABS systems. We will discuss how one of the simpler systems works.

11 The controller monitors the speed sensors at all times. It is looking for decelerations in the wheel that are out of the ordinary. Right before a wheel locks up, it will experience a rapid deceleration. If left unchecked, the wheel would stop much more quickly than any car could. It might take a car five seconds to stop from 60 mph (96.6 kph) under ideal conditions, but a wheel that locks up could stop spinning in less than a second. The ABS controller knows that such a rapid deceleration is impossible, so it reduces the pressure to that brake until it sees an acceleration, then it increases the pressure until it sees the deceleration again. It can do this very quickly, before the tire can actually significantly change speed. The result is that the tire slows down at the same rate as the car, with the brakes keeping the tires very near the point at which they will start to lock up. This gives the system maximum braking power. When the ABS system is in operation you will feel a pulsing in the brake pedal; this comes from the rapid opening and closing of the valves. Some ABS systems can cycle up to 15 times per second.

Types Of Anti Lock Brakes

Anti-lock braking systems use different schemes depending on the type of brakes in use. We will refer to them by the number of channels -- that is, how many valves that are individually controlled -- and the number of speed sensors.

Four-channel, four-sensor ABS - This is the best scheme. There is a speed sensor on all four wheels and a separate valve for all four wheels. With this setup, the controller monitors each wheel individually to make sure it is achieving maximum braking force.

Three-channel, three-sensor ABS - This scheme, commonly found on pickup trucks with four-wheel ABS, has a speed sensor and a valve for each of the front wheels, with one valve and one sensor for both rear wheels. The speed sensor for the rear wheels is located in the rear axle.

12 This system provides individual control of the front wheels, so they can both achieve maximum braking force. The rear wheels, however, are monitored together; they both have to start to lock up before the ABS will activate on the rear. With this system, it is possible that one of the rear wheels will lock during a stop, reducing brake effectiveness.

One-channel, one-sensor ABS - This system is commonly found on pickup trucks with rear-wheel ABS. It has one valve, which controls both rear wheels, and one speed sensor, located in the rear axle. This system operates the same as the rear end of a three-channel system. The rear wheels are monitored together and they both have to start to lock up before the ABS kicks in. In this system it is also possible that one of the rear wheels will lock, reducing brake effectiveness.

This system is easy to identify. Usually there will be one brake line going through a T-fitting to both rear wheels. You can locate the speed sensor by looking for an electrical connection near the differential on the rear-axle housing.

Dangerous Defects In A.B.S.

There have been a number of complaints made concerning cars and trucks equipped with antilock brake systems, including the failure of systems to consistently engage properly. Another major concern is that automobile manufacturers have not sufficiently educated and instructed the purchasers of automobiles with antilock brake systems on the proper and safe operation of a vehicle with antilock brake systems.

Many Drivers Do Not Know How To Use A.B.S.

Because antilock brake systems are new to many new car buyers, many drivers do not know how antilock brakes work, and how to operate the brakes in order to activate the antilock feature effectively. To use the antilock feature effectively in

13 an emergency braking situation, the brake pedal needs to be depressed as fast and as hard as possible and held down and not "pumped." This is the opposite of how people are taught to avoid skids with conventional brakes. There have been a number of collisions reported which were caused by the failure of the driver to properly operate and apply the brakes in a vehicle with antilock brakes.

III Seat Belts How Seat Belts Work Crashing Concepts

The basic idea of a seatbelt is very simple: It keeps you from flying through the windshield or hurdling toward the dashboard when your car comes to an abrupt stop. But why would this happen in the first place? In short, because of inertia. Inertia is an object's tendency to keep moving until something else works against this motion. To put it another way, inertia is every object's resistance to changing its speed and direction of travel. Things naturally want to keep going. If a car is speeding along at 50 miles per hour, inertia wants to keep it going 50 mph in one direction. Air resistance and friction with the road are constantly slowing it down, but the engine's power compensates for this energy loss. Anything that is in the car, including the driver and passengers, has its own inertia, which is separate from the car's inertia. The car accelerates riders to its speed. Imagine that you're coasting at a steady 50 miles per hour. Your speed and the car's speed are pretty much equal, so you feel like you and the car are moving as a single unit. But if the car were to crash into a telephone pole, it would be obvious that your inertia and the car's were absolutely independent. The force of the pole would bring the car to an abrupt stop, but your speed would remain the same. Without a

14 seatbelt, you would either slam into the steering wheel at 50 miles per hour or go flying through the windshield at 50 miles per hour. Just as the pole slowed the car down, the dashboard, windshield or the road would slow you down by exerting a tremendous amount of force. It is a given that no matter what happens in a crash, something would have to exert force on you to slow you down. But depending on where and how the force is applied, you might be killed instantly or you might walk away from the damage unscathed. If you hit the windshield with your head, the stopping power is concentrated on one of the most vulnerable parts of your body. It also stops you very quickly, since the glass is a hard surface. This can easily kill or severely injure a person. A seatbelt applies the stopping force to more durable parts of the body over a longer period of time. In the next section, we'll see how this reduces the chances of major injury.

A typical seatbelt consists of a lap belt, which rests over your pelvis, and a shoulder belt, which extends across your chest. The two belt sections are tightly secured to the frame of the car in order to hold passengers in their seats. When the belt is worn correctly, it will apply most of the stopping force to the rib cage and the pelvis, which are relatively sturdy parts of the body. Since the belts extend across a wide section of your body, the force isn't concentrated in a small area, so it can't do as much damage. Additionally, the seatbelt webbing is made of more flexible material than the dashboard or windshield. It stretches a little bit, which means the stop isn't quite so abrupt. The seatbelt shouldn't give more than a little, however, or you might bang into the steering wheel or side window. Safe seatbelts will only let you shift forward slightly.

15 A car's crumple zones do the real work of softening the blow. Crumple zones are areas in the front and rear of a car that collapse relatively easily. Instead of the entire car coming to an abrupt stop when it hits an obstacle, it absorbs some of the impact force by flattening, like an empty soda can. The car's cabin is much sturdier, so it does not crumple around the passengers. It continues moving briefly, crushing the front of the car against the obstacle. Of course, crumple zones will only protect you if you move with the cab of the car -- that is, if you are secured to the seat by your seatbelt. The simplest sort of seatbelt, found in some roller coasters, consists of a length of webbing bolted to the body of the vehicle. These belts hold you tightly against the seat at all times, which is very safe but not particularly comfortable. Car seatbelts have the ability to extend and retract -- you can lean forward easily while the belt stays fairly taut. But in a collision, the belt will suddenly tighten up and hold you in place. In the next section, we'll look at the machinery that makes all this possible.

Extend And Retract

In a typical seatbelt system, the belt webbing is connected to a retractor mechanism. The central element in the retractor is a spool, which is attached to one end of the webbing. Inside the retractor, a spring applies a rotation force, or torque, to the spool. This works to rotate the spool so it winds up any loose webbing. When you pull the webbing out, the spool rotates counter-clockwise, which turns the attached spring in the same direction. Effectively, the rotating spool works to untwist the spring. The spring wants to return to its original shape, so it resists this twisting motion. If you release the webbing, the spring will tighten up, rotating the spool clockwise until there is no more slack in the belt.

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A spiraled spring rotates the spool to keep the seatbelt webbing taut.

The retractor has a locking mechanism that stops the spool from rotating when the car is involved in a collision. There are two sorts of locking systems in common use today:

systems triggered by the car's movement systems triggered by the belt's movement

The first sort of system locks the spool when the car rapidly decelerates (when it hits something, for example). The diagram below shows the simplest version of this design. The central operating element in this mechanism is a weighted pendulum. When the car comes to a sudden stop, the inertia causes the pendulum to swing forward. The pawl on the other end of the pendulum catches hold of a toothed ratchet gear attached to the spool. With the pawl gripping one of its teeth, the gear can't rotate counter-clockwise, and neither can the connected spool. When the webbing loosens again after the crash, the gear rotates clockwise and the pawl disengages

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The second kind of system locks the spool when something jerks the belt webbing. The activating force in most designs is the speed of the spool rotation. The diagram shows a common configuration. The central operating element in this design is a centrifugal clutch -- a weighted pivoting lever mounted to the rotating spool. When the spool spins slowly, the lever doesn't pivot at all. A spring keeps it in position. But when something yanks the webbing, spinning the spool more quickly, centrifugal force drives the weighted end of the lever outward. The extended lever pushes a cam piece mounted to the retractor housing. The cam is connected to a pivoting pawl by a sliding pin. As the cam shifts to the left, the pin moves along a groove in the pawl. This pulls the pawl into the spinning ratchet gear attached to the spool. The pawl locks into the gear's teeth, preventing counter-clockwise rotation. In some newer seatbelt systems, a pretensioner also works to tighten the belt webbing. In the next section, we'll see how these devices work.

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The Pretensioner
The idea of a pretensioner is to tighten up any slack in the belt webbing in the event of a crash. Whereas the conventional locking mechanism in a retractor keeps the belt from extending any farther, the pretensioner actually pulls in on the belt. This force helps move the passenger into the optimum crash position in his or her seat. Pretensioners normally work together with conventional locking mechanisms, not in place of them. There are a number of different pretensioner systems on the market. Some pretensioners pull the entire retractor mechanism backward and some rotate the spool itself. Generally, pretensioners are wired to the same central control processor that activates the car's air bags. The processor monitors mechanical or electronic motion sensors that respond to the sudden deceleration of an impact. When an impact is detected, the processor activates the pretensioner and then the air bag.

19 Some pretensioners are built around electric motors or solenoids, but the most popular designs today use pyrotechnics to pull in the belt webbing. The diagram below shows a representative model.

When the gas is ignited, the pressure pushes the piston up to rotate the retractor.

The central element in this pretensioner is a chamber of combustible gas. Inside the chamber, there is a smaller chamber with explosive igniter material. This smaller chamber is outfitted with two electrodes, which are wired to the central processor. When the processor detects a collision, it immediately applies an electrical current across the electrodes. The spark from the electrodes ignites the igniter material, which combusts to ignite the gas in the chamber. The burning gas generates a great deal of outward pressure. The pressure pushes on a piston resting in the chamber, driving it upward at high speed.

20 A rack gear is fastened to one side of the piston. When the piston shoots up, the rack gear engages a gear connected to the retractor spool mechanism. The speeding rack rotates the spool forcefully, winding up any slack belt webbing.

Load Limiters
In severe crashes, when a car collides with an obstacle at extremely high speed, a seatbelt can inflict serious damage. As a passenger's inertial speed increases, it takes a greater force to bring the passenger to a stop. In other words, the faster you're going on impact, the harder the seatbelt will push on you. Some seatbelt systems use load limiters to minimize belt-inflicted injury. The basic idea of a load limiter is to release a little more excess belt webbing when a great deal of force is applied to the belt. The simplest load limiter is a fold sewn into the belt webbing. The stitches holding the fold in place are designed to break when a certain amount of force is applied to the belt. When the stitches come apart, the webbing unfolds, allowing the belt to extend a little bit more. More advanced load limiters rely on a torsion bar in the retractor mechanism. A torsion bar is just a length of metal material that will twist when enough force is applied to it. In a load limiter, the torsion bar is secured to the locking mechanism on one end and the rotating spool on the other. In a less severe accident, the torsion bar will hold its shape, and the spool will lock along with the locking mechanism. But when a great deal of force is applied to the webbing (and therefore the spool), the torsion bar will twist slightly. This allows the webbing to extend a little bit farther. Over the years, seatbelts have proven to be far and away the most important safety device in cars and trucks. They are by no means infallible, however, and car safety engineers see a lot of room for improvement in today's design. In the future, cars will be outfitted with better belts, better air bags and, most likely, completely new safety technology. Of course, the government will still have to address the biggest problem with safety devices -- getting people to use them.

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References
www.howstuffworks.com www.airbagzone.com www.sae.org www.bmw.com Sae Magazines