Crashworthiness analysis of a truck

This paper presents a computer-based technique for the dynamic analysis of multibody systems undergoing large motion and nonlinear structural deformations. As a specific example, this formulation is applied to the rollover simulation of a truck in order to determine the deformation of its safety rollbar cage. The multibody equations of motion are generated systematically form the data that describe the system. The safety rollbar cage is modeled by the finite element method. The rigid body motion of the structure is included in the finite element equations of motion. In severe rollover or crash situations, elasto-plastic material characteristics are considered. Due to the size and the nonlinearity of the equations of motion, the computational efforts in solving these equations may be considerable. For this reason, a simplification technique for reducing the number of degrees of freedom is discussed.