F2008-04-022
An Ergonomic Investigation for the Discomfort of the Lower Extremities During Ingress/Egress of SUV
The purpose of the study is to investigate the discomfort of the lower extremities during ingress/egress of sports utility vehicles (SUV). Ingress/egress is one of the most important issues for ergonomic evaluation of vehicles. Nowadays the width of the side sill of SUV tends to increase in order to strengthen `touch´ feeling of SUV, which could make the customers hard to ingress and/or egress and increase the discomfort of the lower extremities of the customers during ingress/egress. It means that, in order to determine the optimal side sill design of SUV, we have to consider the trade-off between the `touch´ feeling of SUV and the ease to ingress/egress. So we investigated the subjective discomfort of the lower extremities for several design alternatives of the side sill, especially for SUV. A three-factor within subject design was adopted for the experiment. As independent variables, the step over width, the step height and the H-pt height were selected. The independent variables mean that step over width means a distance from the seated hip point (H-pt) to the most outward point of the side sill, the distance from the ground to the highest point of the side sill, and the distance from the ground to the seated hip point (H-pt), respectively. For the statistical analyses, the subjective discomfort during ingress and/or egress was selected as a dependent variable. The subjects were asked to stand at a specified position in front of the front door, then ingress with their own pace, take their preferred driving posture, and finally egress out of the vehicle, with a specified side sill. After the second trials of ingress/egress, they evaluated the subjective discomfort during ingress/egress with 9-point scales. We will analyze and discuss the effects of the step over width, the step height and the H-pt height on the discomfort of the lower extremities during ingress/egress of SUV.
Poster presentation: Body design for passenger cars, trucks and buses