Use of a head component tester to evaluate the injury potential of an aircraft head-up display

Abstract

Title 14 of the Code of Federal Regulations Part 25, 25.785 requires that seats and adjacent parts of the airplane be designed so that occupants will not suffer serious injury during an emergency landing as a result of expected inertial forces. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) guidance material cites several component impact test methods for use in determining whether an item or surface is potentially injurious. A head component tester (HCT) developed at the National Institute for Aviation Research of the Wichita State University was selected to assess the injury potential of a new cockpit-installed head-up display (HUD)'s combiner glass. A test procedure complying with the intent of the FAA guidance material was developed and validated by the Civil Aerospace Medical Institute (CAMI), Oklahoma City, OK. Subsequently, a computer model of the HCT impact into the HUD was developed by The Engineering Institute, Farmington, AR, and was correlated with CAMI test data. Thi! s model is useful for evaluating the effect of design parameters on HUD injury potential.