Completely new concept for inflating airbags

Autoliv has announced it has developed a completely new concept for inflating airbags that is more environmentally friendly and more cost efficient than traditional inflator technologies. In addition, it reduces the inflator’s weight by 20 per cent compared to most inflators for the intended application.
March 22, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
4171 Autoliv has announced it has developed a completely new concept for inflating airbags that is more environmentally friendly and more cost efficient than traditional inflator technologies. In addition, it reduces the inflator’s weight by 20 per cent compared to most inflators for the intended application.

The new inflator went into production earlier this year, in a passenger-side airbag for a European manufacturer of premium-brand vehicles. It uses hydrogen and oxygen with inert gas to inflate the airbag, instead of pyro­technic substances. As a result, there are no waste particles at all from the combustion and no effluent gases, not even carbon dioxide. The only side product is regular vapour which, when cooled off, becomes just a few drops of pure water, making the inflator extremely environmentally friendly.

In addition, the mixing of the hydrogen and the oxygen takes place in the textile cushion of the airbag, instead of in a steel vessel as in traditional airbag inflators, which allows for a thinner and lighter steel container and reduces weight and costs.

Autoliv says the weight reduction depends on the original inflator but is approximately 20% compared to most traditional inflators for airbags on the front passenger side. If only a quarter of company’s own needs for such passenger airbag inflators were converted to the new hydrogen/oxygen technology, Autoliv says it would save 1,000 tons of steel every year. Additionally, the vehicles with the new inflator would reduce their fuel consumption by more than eight million litres over the expected life time of the vehicles.

The new APG hydrogen/oxygen inflator will primarily be used in frontal airbags for the front-passenger side where higher gas quantities are required than for other airbags in a vehicle. The next step for this technology is to develop a dual-stage version of the inflator to be able to adjust the gas flow to the severity of the crash and to other parameters. Autoliv says this will be done using two independent ignitors and varying the time lapse a few milliseconds between the ignitions.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • User based insurance is helping good drivers and identifying the bad ones
    November 28, 2013
    Thomas Hallauer gives an overview of Usage Based Insurance (UBI), an industry that is putting telematic devices into more vehicles than fleet management ever did. The insurance market is going through a transformation phase never seen before. Insurers have not only started to track individual cars for Usage Based Insurance (UBI), they are also using the technology to enhance consumer services as more drivers join up to these schemes. Progressive Insurance in the US has 1.4 million customers signed up to
    Read More
  • ITS homes in on cycling safety
    April 9, 2014
    A new generation of ITS equipment is helping road authorities get to grips with cycle safety – and not a moment too soon as Colin Sowman discovers. Cyclists - remember them? Apparently not. At least not according to the OECD 2013 report Cycling, Health and Safety which contains the statement: ‘Cyclists are often forgotten in the design of the road traffic system’. Looking through the statistics that exist (each country appears to compile them differently) it is not difficult to see how such a conclusion cou
    Read More
  • Shell introduces fuel cell truck
    October 14, 2021
    Shell, MaierKorduletsch and Paul Nutzfahrzeuge are introducing a medium-duty fuel cell truck to activate the market for hydrogen used as a fuel in the medium to heavy duty road transport sector
    Read More
  • Asia's first hybrid electric ferry sets sail for cleaner sea travel
    February 3, 2017
    The Taiwanese harbour city of Kaohsiung has launched a new hybrid electric ferry, which it is claimed could revolutionise marine passenger transport across the region by curbing greenhouse and diesel emissions. The city recently re-launched the popular Cijian Island passenger ferry, retrofitted with a Visedo electric propulsion system, replacing the original diesel engine. If successful, the Kaohsiung City Government plans to retrofit the rest of its diesel fleet to help reduce pollution levels around Ta
    Read More

Highlighted Content