MOTORCYCLE IMPACTS WITH GUARDRAILS

Although we note few motorcycle accidents with guardrail impacts, one frequent concern of motorcyclists is the exaggeration of risk due to the presence of guardrail. A study has been done in order to specify the real hazard of these accidents in different areas: rural highways and urban highways. The most important problem remains on the urban highways: the accidents with guardrail impacts represent one third of motorcycle injury accidents and lead to a third of the fatalities. The most common crash happens in curves, often with the motorcyclist falling down and knocking his head into the guardrail posts. A guardrail with two beams was designed and tested in order to avoid the posts motorcyclists impact. Tests were performed with a dummy ejected from a sled. The deceleration levels registered on different parts of the dummy were acceptable. Tests with cars were conducted to confirm this model.