airbags

What gas is an airbag filled with?

Norm Strong

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kid, and

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A girl friend of mine lost control, and the car landed upside down, funny thing was she pulled the handbrake on before climbing out. 8-)

It uses a pyrotechnic charge to fill, so the gas is whatever compound results from the chemical reaction. I'm sure the information is available online somwhere.

Airbags are powered by sodium azide tablets, which decompose explosively into sodium metal and nitrogen gas.

Cheers!

Chip Shults

The majority of the pyrotechnic charge is (it says here) sodium azide. When this material is ignited, it burns very rapidly, producing nitrogen gas with a number of byproducts (including a small amount of sodium hydroxide a.k.a. lye).

--
Dave Platt                                    AE6EO
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And somewhere around the time of 02/19/2004 22:27, the world stopped and listened as Dave Platt contributed the following to humanity:

There's a company out in my parts that make those charges. They're called Explosive Technology and they are localed FAR AWAY from civilization in the back hills of Suisun City, CA. They also make that detionation wire that burns at 12,000 Feet Per Second that will cut anything that's in contact with it. Used for pyrotechnics in movies and such, or when you need to make an emergancy escape route really quick. :)

As for the charges, the explosive force of an airbag deployment is equivilent to a 12 guage shotgun blast.

--
Daniel Rudy

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And somewhere around the time of 02/17/2004 22:31, the world stopped and listened as Watson A.Name - "Watt Sun, the Dark Remover" contributed the following to humanity:

I live in California. I was told, by a law enforcement officer, that if someone breaks into your house, make damn sure that you shoot them, dead. If they manage to crwal out of your house, drag them back in and hope to God that no one saw you.

He suggested using a .357 or .44 Magnum with hollowpoints...

--
Daniel Rudy

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Don't know Jim, It was Jeff who said it ;)

-Lasse

Many cars with ABS will do it - the pedal just pulsates, while the braking system makes a weird sound, and the car keeps rolling down the hill at an approximate constant slow speed. The car I was driving was an almost brand new Pontiac GTX Sunfire. I much prefer the older, non ABS brakes - I can control a car much better with standard brakes. Many people around here complain about ABS brakes in the winter, and want them disabled. It's like they were never tested in winter conditions. I would hate to have ABS on a road with partial icy patches, such as one side on snow or bare road, and the other on a strip of ice from previous cars compacting the snow, or from runoff freezing.

All I keep hearing is *GM*. Any other brands with ABS problems?

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

Well, of course they were tested on snow and ice, but they are not magic.

Here's a good explanation of the tradeoffs:

And here are some experimental results:

Both found in 30 seconds with Google...

What's this "snow and ice" stuff ?:-)

I'm puzzled by the statement, "ABS was introduced in the mid -1980s". I drove a T-bird test vehicle at the Dearborn facility of Ford in the late '60's to evaluate some of my chip designs.

The only people who harp about the inadequacies of ABS are the same ones who claim you're safer not wearing a seat belt.

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

ABS systems are perfect here in icy Sweden. And even our big 18 meters, 25 metric tons heavy (full load 110 people) articulated buses have ABS and can handle ice and severe situations and make it possible to steer where I want (I'm a busdriver). Without ABS it's a little tricky to brake this long buses and still get i strait.

ABS are made for roads with partial icy patches, that's the reason they made ABS. If it don't works well it is faulty or wrong made.

--
 + Ken +

"Dave VanHorn" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:

Those strobe lights are just dangerous at night. They have them in Arkansas too. Luckily they don't have them here in Oklahoma.

I didn't say they don't go straight, that they usually do perfectly fine, they just don't stop under some circumstances, or take much longer to stop. ABS most likely reduces serous crashes from people loosing control (on ice, snow, etc), and in turn, creates some minor fender benders.

roll

braking

brand

like

a

from

I would agree, except that other brands seem to have similar issues.

[snip]

Specifically? ISTR, from my experience with ABS designs, that there is a low speed drop-out where ABS action ceases... thus none of the slow-speed ice/gravel problems as reported here.

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

They didn't become common until the mid 80's though, while I'm sure they exist, I've never seen a pre-'80 car with ABS.

And those who own/have driven a car with a lousy ABS system, they're not all created equally.

Hmmm. My only accident to date was in a 1994-vintage vehicle with ABS; I was doing 10mph down an off-ramp when I should have been doing 5, and I couldn't stop in time to miss the snowplough in front of me - thereby losing a headlamp on my wife's Taurus and damaging one fender, the hood and the header panel (all of which I replaced by myself in our parking spot at our apartment - without doubt the most backbreaking task I've ever performed).

I don't know that I trust it to do anything useful. On the other hand, I don't know that it actively causes harm. The bottom line is that if I was offered a choice of cars and the only difference was ABS and price, I'd go for the cheaper option without ABS.