Originally Posted by hpw912 (Post 7350368)

Kiddie crash test dummies not fat enough
By David Menzies for MSN Autos

Engineers who design crash test dummies apparently need to supersize the kiddie version: child-sized crash test dummies simply aren’t fat enough to measure up to today’s increasingly obese kids. The end result: a number of children’s car seats aren’t being properly tested given that a sufficiently chubby kiddie crash test dummy hasn’t been developed.

According to a report in the UK’s Daily Mail, stringent testing laws only apply to seats that are designed to carry children who weigh less than 65 lbs. But with more than 10% of two- to three-year-olds now clinically obese (and over the 65-lb. weight limit) it’s feared federally-accredited child seat tests (and the dummies used in the testing) fail to accurately reflect today’s chubbier children.

The lack of adequate testing means parents may end up squeezing their overweight offspring into seats that are too small – or into seats that aren’t officially certified.

While a growing number of manufacturers make child seats catering to toddlers who weigh up to 85 lbs., the lack of a similarly weighted test dummy means these seats cannot be assessed by authorities. Instead, it’s up to each individual company to “assure” the safety of their own seats.

Of note, a 2006 study entitled, “Tipping the Scales: Obese Children and Child Safety Seats”, found a growing mismatch between the number of fatter children and the lack of adequately tested child seats.
“There is limited availability of child safety seat types for the ever-increasing number of obese young children,” researchers noted. “There are substantial numbers of children who weigh more than the upper weight limit for most currently available child safety seats.”



While modern adult crash test dummies have been in development for decades, their child counterparts are significantly less advanced. This is partly due to the reluctance of testers to use child cadavers to gain vital research into how a child’s body reacts to a crash.
Even so, there are significant differences. The physiological make-up of a child differs from that of an adult given that children have less rigid spines and weaker chests than adults – two key aspects missing from the child test dummy currently used by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The NHTSA uses a smaller version of its adult crash test dummy to test child seats. And while a new child crash test dummy was supposed to be built by 2004, researchers are still waiting for a finished product.

Autumn Alexander Skeen – a car safety campaigner whose son was killed in a crash – says she’s disappointed with the delay.

“There’s not enough guidance,” she says. “Parents are looking at things like cup holders. They’re not coming to it looking at the correct way for the shoulder belt to cross the clavicle."

Originally Posted by PiuYi (Post 7351633)

wow they use human cadavers to design crash test dummies?? never knew that

Originally Posted by PiuYi (Post 7351633)

wow they use human cadavers to design crash test dummies?? never knew that