RE: Airbag poisons driver
Discussion
Toffer said:
At TVR, Peter Wheeler's philosophy was " “If someone crashes one of my cars and it’s their fault then I can live with myself. If we were to put an airbag in one of our cars and it ended up killing someone, I couldn’t live with that ”.
I understand that he believed that in the event of a "roll-over" accident in a convertible, the driver's head would be pushed into danger by the air bag?
Understand this - if you roll a TVR, you're fI understand that he believed that in the event of a "roll-over" accident in a convertible, the driver's head would be pushed into danger by the air bag?
ked.When we made airbag inflators for Ford the sodium azide mixture was pressed into large grains or pucks about 3/4" thick and 1 1/2" in diameter. They were also coated in a pyrotechnic mixture to spread the flame over the whole surface very quickly after ignition so it would produce gas at the required rate. The grains themselves were not particularly hazardous to handle (from the toxicity point of view) and would have been impossible to swallow or inhale. The main toxicity hazard in the plant was from azide dust that would react with moisture and carbon dioxide to form hydrozioc acid which is very toxic. I have been out of the business for some time but I would have thought that to control the burn speed you would still need pressed grains with a known surface area as the burn rate is very critical. It must happen within, I think, about 20 milliseconds or the airbag wont be inflated in time but if it happens much faster then the pressure from the inflation itself will injure the car occupants. When I left we were working on units where the inflation time could be changed so it would be quicker for high speed crashes.
Prof Prolapse said:
Respiratory toxicology was what the cool kids studied.
You jumped the gun a bit was all. Just because it is anti-microbial doesn't mean it will be in vivo. That and any affect will be transient. Unlike the associated damage to the lungs which presumably resulted in fibrosis, poor lung clearance etc. then all it takes is a bit of fluid build up (a known effect of Sodium Azide) then bacteria infestation is pretty much a certainty. You even don't even need outside infection, just an inbalance in the "floral" bacteria already in your lungs. Then it's game over.
Speculated a little. But you catch my drift I'm sure.
Yup, I get what you're saying. My own personal experience of sodium azide is simply its use as a preservative - adding it to various liquid mixtures and suspensions to increase shelf life.You jumped the gun a bit was all. Just because it is anti-microbial doesn't mean it will be in vivo. That and any affect will be transient. Unlike the associated damage to the lungs which presumably resulted in fibrosis, poor lung clearance etc. then all it takes is a bit of fluid build up (a known effect of Sodium Azide) then bacteria infestation is pretty much a certainty. You even don't even need outside infection, just an inbalance in the "floral" bacteria already in your lungs. Then it's game over.
Speculated a little. But you catch my drift I'm sure.
Having said that, we did try to limit its use due to its inherent toxicity. I didn't realise at the time that it also had explosive properties!
My understanding was that the biggest chemical risk with azide airbag charges was the metallic powdered sodium that forms along with the hot nitrogen. This will react with the water on your skin/in your lungs and mucous membranes to produce sodium hydroxide (caustic soda). That's not too pleasant, but I'm sure much is done to contain the sodium.
DJ_AS said:
Yup, I get what you're saying. My own personal experience of sodium azide is simply its use as a preservative - adding it to various liquid mixtures and suspensions to increase shelf life.
Having said that, we did try to limit its use due to its inherent toxicity. I didn't realise at the time that it also had explosive properties!
Explosive as well eh? Thank goodness I don't have airbags... Having said that, we did try to limit its use due to its inherent toxicity. I didn't realise at the time that it also had explosive properties!
LongRat said:
My understanding was that the biggest chemical risk with azide airbag charges was the metallic powdered sodium that forms along with the hot nitrogen. This will react with the water on your skin/in your lungs and mucous membranes to produce sodium hydroxide (caustic soda). That's not too pleasant, but I'm sure much is done to contain the sodium.
That's more plausible.Pneumonia can be triggered by inhaling all sorts of things. Flames being particularly nasty.
Then a bacterial infection can easily spread.
One of those unfortunate things, I'm afraid.
Mr. Smith was involved with a six-car crash in 2010. He was uninjured and the crash was relatively minor, but, unfortunately, the airbag that saved his life also took him. The automaker Vauxhall, a subsidiary of General Motors, said that it is investigating the matter, but made no further comment. I read this here: Man dies from inhaling air bag gases.
Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff