Would Wheel Air Bags Increase Your Safety?

Ford believes so. Vehicle safety innovation is big business, with millions invested in R&D. Therefore, it is no surprise that the number of patent applications directed to improving automotive safety is staggering.

A Ford patent application was published this week with the title “deployable device mounted to vehicle frame.” The application describes the invention as:

A vehicle includes a frame, a wheel supported by the frame; and a device fixed to the frame. The device includes an inflator and an inflatable member in fluid communication with the inflator. The inflatable member is inflatable away from the frame and into contact with the wheel to push the wheel away from the frame during sensed impact of the vehicle.

The application goes on to explain:

[0001] During an offset frontal impact of a vehicle, the impact is offset from major structural components of the vehicle. Offset frontal impacts can be simulated with a small offset rigid barrier (“SORB”) frontal crash test. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (“IIHS”) sets a standard for SORB frontal crash tests. In a SORB frontal crash test, the vehicle impacts a rigid barrier at 40 miles/hour with 25% of an outer portion of a front end of the vehicle overlapping the rigid barrier.

[0002] During a SORB impact, the rigid barrier may tend to miss the major structural components of the vehicle, e.g., a frame rail. Consequently, the rigid barrier may directly impact a wheel of the vehicle, thereby pushing the wheel toward a passenger cabin of the vehicle. In such instances, the orientation of the wheel may determine the likelihood of the wheel entering into the passenger cabin, e.g., through a floor or dash of the vehicle. The wheel turned away from the frame rail of the vehicle may reduce the likelihood of the wheel entering into the passenger cabin. Intrusion of the wheel into the passenger cabin of the vehicle is a metric recorded in the IIHS SORB frontal crash test.

 

This is an interesting idea, which will hopefully save some lives if it ever makes its way into actual products. Keep innovating! If you are a vehicle safety gearhead you may want to check out this book.

Dave Dawsey – The Vehicle Safety Patent Attorney

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