Various successful biofidelic simulations of vehicle-pedestrian collisions exist for research and design purposes, but are impractical for routine accident investigation and reconstruction. Reconstructions with a full pedestrian crash dummy and a representative vehicle have always been problematic because robust and representative dummies are expensive, and need replacement components after tests if they are as fragile as the human frame. This is not an issue below injury thresholds, but such cases are rarely of forensic interest. Many reconstructions have nevertheless used crash dummies to establish impact speeds by correlating vehicle damage location and extent, and the throw distance, but this can be a circular process subject to low biofidelity and systematic errors.

An alternative is to use expendable, simplified dummies in reconstruction exercises. This paper uses results from similar impact configurations of earlier humanoid computer simulations and from separate testing of a dummy developed for police reconstructions in the expectation of guiding further application of the simplified dummy method.

Correlation of the kinematics up to dummy/vehicle separation between the computer simulations and the dummy tests was close enough to provide some confidence based on the limited materials available for study. Initial contact, timing, contact locations and motions of the dummy parts not contacting the car corresponded with little variation due to differences between the simulation and test impact initial velocities. Pedestrian posture, point of impact and vehicle specification aligned well, as did braking and pitch of the vehicle during impact, previously shown to have a material influence on the trajectory of the pedestrian and by implication the throw distance, in addition to the other configuration parameters. The results are therefore confined to the configuration used for this analysis and further work would be needed to generalise the findings for other vehicle shapes, speeds and contact points, pedestrian stature and posture.