Correlation Analysis between Wheelchair Multi-layer Headrest Foam Properties and Injury Index

Although the development of transportation means has realized the right to mobility for the disabled who have difficulty in moving, it can be said that the improvement of the safety of passengers with disabilities that can occur in a car accident is lower than that of ordinary passenger seats. In particular, in the case of a rear-end collision that can occur suddenly, it is a reality that disabled passengers are vulnerable to head and neck injuries. Therefore, in this study, a multi-layer headrest foam that divides the headrest into three parts in the coronal plane was proposed to improve the head and neck injury index of disabled passengers in the vehicle in the event of a rear-end collision of a wheelchair transport vehicle. A range of stress scale factors was selected to give various compressive characteristics of the foam through low-speed rear-end collision analysis through a simple model, and GA optimization was performed by specifying the range as a parameter. Through the optimization result, the phase relationship between HIC and NIC was analyzed according to the compression characteristics of the layers. HIC responded most sensitively to the compression characteristics of the front layer and NIC responded to the compression characteristics of the mid layer, and the compression characteristics of the rear layer showed the lowest. A normal headrest and an optimized multi-layer headrest were placed in the validation model to analyze the low -speed rear-end collision sled test, and HIC and NIC were derived lower in the multi-layer headrest than in the general headrest. The compression behavior of the multi-layer headrest was also clearly shown, and it was verified that the multi-layer headrest was effective in improving the injury index of the head and neck compared to the general headrest.