Updated review of potential test procedures for FMVSS no.208

The objective of a crash test for Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS) No. 208 is to measure how well a passenger vehicle would protect its occupants in the event of a serious real world frontal crash. The ideal frontal crash procedure will be able to evaluate occupant protection while ensuring that the vehicle will not jeopardize its crash friendliness with its collision partners. The test conditions (e.g., impact speed, impact angle, and test device) must be representative of the frontal crash environment to which passenger vehicles are exposed on the highway. Finally, to provide assurance of protection in potentially serious injury crashes, the test procedures must be severe enough to represent a crash in which occupants could be seriously injured or killed. This report examines several potential frontal crash test procedures, and evaluates (1) the full frontal fixed barrier test, (2) the oblique frontal fixed barrier test, (3) the generic sled test, (4) the frontal fixed offset deformable barrier test, (5) the perpendicular moving deformable barrier test, (6) the oblique moving deformable barrier test, and (7) the full frontal fixed deformable barrier test. Each procedure is compared with the 48 kph fixed rigid barrier test and the generic sled test currently prescribed in FMVSS No. 208.