RESEARCH ARTICLE
The Effect of Form Factors of Shock Absorption Mat’s Subunits on Attenuation of Force from Elderly’s Fall
Ariya Atthawuttikul1, *, Yada Chavalkul2
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2018Volume: 12
First Page: 350
Last Page: 361
Publisher ID: TOBCTJ-12-350
DOI: 10.2174/1874836801812010350
Article History:
Received Date: 20/6/2018Revision Received Date: 30/8/2018
Acceptance Date: 16/10/2018
Electronic publication date: 27/11/2018
Collection year: 2018
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background and Objective:
The purpose of this study was to investigate how differently various form factors of subunits of shock absorption mat attenuate force from the elderly’s fall.
Methods:
The study procedures were the following: (1) literature review: possible form factors affecting the shock absorbing capacity were analyzed and synthesized from the review; (2) synthesis of design criteria: criteria for force simulation were formulated based on the information from the review; and (3) simulation: simulation of force from elderly’s fall absorbed by such mats with the following control and independent variables that were analyzed and synthesized in the previous steps: (control variables): 1) impact force, 2) physical properties of the rubber material; (independent variables): 1) form of cross-section, 2) form of edges, 3) pattern of arrangement of subunits in the structural layer, and 4) dimensional proportion of subunits.
Results and Conclusion:
The simulation results show that the subunits with a circular-cross-section and hourglass-like-edge form factors were the best at attenuating impact force. The best pattern of subunit arrangement was a table arrangement. This study was a preliminary study to a design of subunits of shock absorption mat. The results would be used in the next, more comprehensive study.
