Airbags: What are they and why you should seriously consider buying a car with them

Airbags

Brushed metal and for that matter even plastic, looks gorgeous and feels classy to touch, as long as it is voluntary. We mean the touching part. Coming to the involuntary bit, metal and plastic aren’t exactly jelly-like and hence hitting them with considerable force causes plenty of damage to the body that hits them. More so, if the body in question is your head, chest or your tummy.

We’re talking about cars, car crashes and more importantly things that will save your skin during a car crash. Enter the Airbag.

As more and more Indian cars are being outfitted with these vital pieces of safety kit, either as a part of original equipment or as an optional extra, we thought we’d bring you a detailed feature post on Airbags. Let’s kick things off with a brief history of car safety. Seatbelts were one of the first passive safety features that cars came with, prior to the airbags. Seatbelts are mainly designed to prevent the driver/passengers to move round uncontrollably in the car, hitting things like the windshield, dashboard, etc in the process.

While the seatbelts are pretty effective at minimizing frontal impact, what about the impact on the sides or a rollover impact? This is where another passive device called the airbags, chip in, and do a good job of providing safety during side-on/rollover impacts.

First invented by Allan Breed in 1968, the airbag is not too dissimilar to a balloon. A balloon that is quite tough and one that inflates in milliseconds, after sensing an impact/accident. Thus, the inflated airbag will act like an air filled cushion that prevents injuries to the car’s occupants by separating the hard(read metal, glass and plastic parts) from the relatively fragile human bodies.

Working of an Airbag

Moving on to how the airbags actually work, the airbag, in a deflated form is stored in a suitable compartment, either in the steering wheel, dashboard, the door, the side beams or at any other strategic location depending on which occupant or which part of the occupant’s body it intends to protect. The compartment is designed to collapse behind the airbag, without disintegrating, even as the airbag inflates.

Working of an Airbag

Talking about inflation, let’s examine why and when an airbag will inflate in the first place. As they are passive safety devices, airbags inflate as soon as an impact takes place. How does the airbag know about an impact. It does so, by the means of a complex array of sensors like accelerometers that sense a sudden impact and relay it to the airbag’s inflation system.

The airbag’s inflation system contains chemicals(Sodium Azide and Ammonium Nitrate) which produce hot nitrogen gas in milliseconds. This gas fills rapidly fills the airbags, thus inflating it.

Working of an Airbag

Once inflated, the airbags will come in between you and the not so soft interiors of your car, thus preventing or minimizing injuries significantly. This is how the airbags protect occupants of a car during a car crash. Now, coming to the Indian car scene, more and more cars, including the entry level hatchbacks are featuring airbags, at least as optional extras.

So, now you know what to tick in the options list while you’re buying a new car. Don’t think of the extra cost, you’ll be repaid many times over in the unfortunate, but not unlikely event of a crash. Happy motoring.

Image courtesy: How Stuff Works

Share and Enjoy: