The automotive industry continuously strives to enhance safety for both drivers and passengers through technological advancements. Car side impacts have the potential to significant risks to passengers, So the automotive industry has proposed various technological solutions. As part of these efforts, the development of side impact beams, which are affixed to the inner frame of vehicle side doors to absorb and dissipate collision energy, has been a safety enhancement. Conventional side impact beams are manufactured using hot-rolled steel sheets and have a pipe-like configuration. However, these impact beams are fixed to the vehicle's chassis, which directly transfers the energy generated during a collision to the chassis frame. This paper aims to address this issue by proposing the development and optimization of vehicle door impact beams using a dual-beam structure and fastening method, utilizing shear bolts. Moreover, the focus is on optimizing the cross-sectional shape of the dual-beam impact structure. The evaluation criterion for optimization is based on the second moment of area of the cross-section. To validate these improvements, Static experiments were conducted, comparing the proposed dual-beam structure with the traditional impact beam. This research is expected to serve as a guideline for enhancing vehicle safety through design directions and validation methods.

This paper aims to experimentally and numerically explore fracture mechanism characteristics of ultra-thin chopped carbon fiber tape-reinforced thermoplastics (UT-CTT) hat-shaped hollow beam under transverse static and impact loadings. Three distinct failure modes were observed in the impact bending tests, whereas only one similar progressive collapse mode was observed in the transverse bending tests. The numerical model was to incorporate some hypothetical inter-layers in UT-CTT and assign them with the failure model as cohesive zone model, which can perform non-linear characteristics with failure criterion for representing delamination failure. The dynamic material parameters for the impact model were theoretically predicted with consideration of strain-rate dependency. It shows that the proposed modeling approach for interacting damage modes can serve as a benchmark for modeling damage coupling in composite materials.

Tapered double cantilever beam (TDCB) specimens are the most commonly used test configurations to measure the fracture toughness of composites and adhesive joints. The material used in this study is aluminum alloy. For the impact analysis, load and displacement applied from pin onto end block as well as the crack energy release rate are calculated and compared with the finite element analysis results. The energy release rate increases with the velocity increases. As TDCB model with the same condition as experiment is simulated and analyzed, the fracture behavior can be estimated with the analysis result similar to experiment. The simulation results can be agreed with experimental graph and all experimental data at this study can be verified. These experimental results can be applied into real field effectively. It is found that the energy release rates measured from impact tests on the specimens can be predicted by the finite element model suggested in this study.

This study aims to evaluate structural safety through FEM on the hollow shaft and the shaft filled with aluminum foam as the impact beam made of high tensile strength steel, Force reactions of impact beams are investigated when the forced displacement of 50mm is applied equally on two beams. When impact velocity of 80km/h is applied onto impact beams equally with the limit velocity of automobile on national road, how much impact energies can be absorbed by beams are also investigated. As study result, impact beams without aluminum foam and with aluminum foam show the maximum reaction forces of 15.53kN and 20.34kN respectively in case of the forced displacement of 50mm. As impact analysis result, impact beams without aluminum foam and with aluminum foam can absorb impact energies of 560J and 820J respectively. As impact beam with aluminum foam has reaction force and impact energy more than 23% and 30% than without aluminum foam, impact beam with aluminum foam has more safety than without aluminum foam.