7/29/2019 Airbag Science Speech

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BAM!!! Your head thrusts forward at an incredible speed. Suddenly, a white object flies towards

you, and soon enough, you feel your face covered in a soft mush. Your head falls backwards onto

your seats headrest. An airbag has saved your life. How did it do it?

We must firstly understand the Law of Motion. We know that all moving object have momentum,

which is mass times the velocity of the object. The Law of Motion states that a moving object will

continue travelling in the same speed and direction until a force has stopped it. In the case of a car,

normally the vehicle will collide into something, however, the passengers and the driver continues

to be thrust forward. This is where airbags can save lives.

According to RACQ and How Stuff Works, an airbag is a nylon bag full of air that inflates and

deflates rapidly in the time of a vehicle collision. The drivers frontal airbag is located inside the

steering wheel, while the side passengers airbags pops out of the dashboard. Sensors are used to

determine the severity of a collision, therefore determining whether to deploy the airbag or not.

Once the sensors decide an airbag is to be deployed, the system rapidly burns chemicals producing

huge amounts of nitrogen gas. The filled airbag pops out of the steering wheel or dashboard. At

the same time, the occupant will be thrust forward into the airbag. Once the occupant is in contact

with the airbag, it will deflate through the vent holes in the airbags base. This entire process takes

only a second.

In order for an airbag to deploy, the deceleration forces produced must be at least equal to the

amount produced when a car hits an obstacle at 25km/h and the impact must be within around 30

degrees of either side of the vehicles centre line. Airbags wont deploy if there is no passenger.

This is how an airbag works. Airbags have saved over 28,000 people in the USA alone; Im sure

all of you now realise the airbags potential.

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Reference List

How Stuff Works, Inc.. (1998). How Airbags Work. Available:

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/car-driving-safety/safety-regulatory-devices/airbag1.htm.

Last accessed 09/09/13.

The Royal Automobile Club of Queensland. (2009).Airbags. Available:

http://www.racq.com.au/motoring/cars/safer_cars/safety_fact_sheets/airbags. Last

accessed 09/09/13.

UKIP Media & Events. (2013). Thirty years of saving lives: Happy birthday to the

airbag. Available: http://www.traffictechnologytoday.com/features.php?BlogID=448. Last

accessed 09/09/13.

Anonymous. (2013). The History of Airbags. Available:

http://inventors.about.com/od/astartinventions/a/air_bags.htm. Last accessed 09/09/13.

Private Fleet. (1999). What is Airbags?. Available:

http://www.privatefleet.com.au/glossary/airbags/. Last accessed 09/09/13.