ABSTRACT This study aimed to use a simulated vehicle to asses quantitatively the head and neck injuries of the occupants, in a frontal car crash, when the driver has only one hand on the steering wheel, such as while using a cell phone when driving. First, we conducted a survey of NHTSA reports on real laboratory tests of frontal collisions involving sedans. The effects of these collisions on the neck of a Hybrid III 50th percentile male crash test dummy were measured in terms of average head acceleration and force along the X, Z, and Y-axes. These acceleration, force and torque values obtained from the NHTSA database were used to validate the simulated model. The results obtained were compared with case E, the standard dummy position used in frontal collision tests. The results obtained in the simulation of the four cases of driving with only one hand demonstrate a probability of more than 67% that the driver will sustain AIS+2 injuries during a frontal crash. In all the cases, the skull fracture percentage was the most representative, occurring between 89 and 94% of cases where the driver had only one hand on the steering wheel.

ABSTRACT Duplex stainless steels (DSS) are alloys with binary microstructure consisting of ferrite (δ) and austenite (γ), combining high mechanical properties and corrosion resistance by pitting and stress corrosion, due to the two phases austenite/ferrite. However, the formation of secondary and intermetallic phases, during solidification processes, heat treatment or welding in duplex steels tend to cause the degradation of its main properties. The present study aim to investigate the corrosion behaviour of UNS S82441 aged at 850°C for 30, 300 and 3000 minutes, due to the formation of sigma phase. Corrosion resistance evaluation was performed by means of stress corrosion testing, potenciodinamic polarization and mass loss. The microstructural characterization and morphology confirmed the presence of sigma phase in the UNS S82441 duplex stainless steel, and that the amount of this phase increases with the time of heat treatment of aging. The aging time influences negatively the corrosion resistance of this steel, with a gradual drop of up to 50% on passivation regime for the condition of aging at 850°C for 3000 minutes.