Testing and Modeling the Responses of Hybrid III Crash-Dummy Lower Extremity under High-speed Vertical Loading

Anthropometric test devices (ATDs), such as the Hybrid III crash-test dummy, have been used to simulate lowerextremity responses to military personnel subjected to loading conditions from anti-vehicular (AV) landmine blasts. Numerical simulations [e.g., finite element (FE) analysis] of such high-speed vertical loading on ATD parts require accurate material parameters that are dependent on strain rate. This study presents a combined experimental and computational study to calibrate the rate-dependent properties of three materials on the lower extremities of the Hybrid III dummy. The three materials are heelpad foam, foot skin, and lower-leg flesh, and each has properties that can affect simulation results of forces and moments transferred to the lower extremities. Specifically, the behavior of the heel-pad foam was directly calibrated through standard compression tests, and the properties of the foot skin and lower-leg flesh were calibrated based on an optimization procedure in which the material parameters were adjusted for best fit between the calculated force-deflection responses and least squares of the experimental data. The material models updated with strain-rate effects were then integrated into an ATD full-body FE model (FEM), which was used to simulate vertical impulsive loading responses at different speeds. Results of validations using this model demonstrated basic replication of experimentally obtained response patterns of the tibia. The bending moments matched those calculated from the experimental data 25-40% more accurately than those obtained from the original model, and axial forces were 60-90% more accurate. However, neither the original nor the modified models well captured whole-body response patterns, and further improvements are required. As a generalized approach, the optimization method presented in this paper can be applied to characterize material constants for a wide range of materials.