Driving on the freeway on our way to the coast for a long awaited holiday we find ourselves relaxed. Suddenly the car in front brakes and we drive into the back of him at high speed. The airbags in the steering wheel and dashboard deploy. The children in the back seat only have the seatbelt. It reduces impact but ends up breaking their ribs…
This was the challenge facing engineers at Ford a decade ago. In that time they set out to solve the problem by means of airbag implementation in the back seats. The greatest problem was that the standard airbag deploys using hot gas technology and the deployment is rapid. This would potentially kill young children in the back and thus another solution was required.
Srini Sundararajan, the engineer chiefly responsible for the design, decided to combine a seatbelt with an airbag. This allows for storage of the device but also for safety from impact when the child is sleeping and their head is drooping. The next challenge was to make the deployment less hostile and this was achieved using cold gas technology which lessens the deployment force but still allows a deployment in under a tenth of a second.
This technological advancement is one of great value and while the technology is expensive and only a soon to be option in the Ford Explorer we can be certain that it too will become cheaper and a standard on cars within the near future…
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