An assembly includes a seat bottom including a panel pivotable from a first position to a second position. The assembly includes a track supported by the seat bottom. The assembly includes a spring in the track and urging the panel toward the second position. The assembly includes a pyrotechnic actuator maintaining the spring in compression and actuatable to release the spring.

A pre-crash seat actuator system for moving a vehicle seat includes an occupant protection control system that determines a collision is imminent and provides a trigger signal and an enable signal. A vehicle seat controller receives the trigger signal and determines a moving the vehicle seat to a desired position to mitigate severity of a collision. In response to the trigger signal, the vehicle seat controller provides a fast mode voltage for moving the vehicle seat in a fast mode. A smart control adapter determines whether the fast mode voltage and the enable signal are both received, to provide the fast mode voltage to a vehicle seat electric drive. In another embodiment, the vehicle seat controller receives the trigger signal and a collision signal to provide fast mode voltage, and the seat is returned to an original position when a crash does not occur.

A system and method are provided for controlling an interior configuration of a vehicle following a collision. Sensor data that includes, or is derived from data that includes, data collected by one or more sensors is received, and a vehicle accident condition indicative of an accident having occurred is detected by processing the sensor data. After detecting the vehicle accident condition, an actuator component is caused to prevent a passenger from adjusting an interior vehicle component outside a predetermined range of physical configurations, while allowing the passenger to adjust the interior vehicle component within the predetermined range of physical configurations.

A method for determining the severity of a possible collision between a motor vehicle and another vehicle is disclosed. Sensor data which describes the other vehicle is received from at least one sensor of the motor vehicle by means of a control apparatus, a change in velocity which describes a difference between a velocity (V1) of the motor vehicle before the collision and a collision velocity (Vc) of the motor vehicle (1) after the collision is determined on the basis of the sensor data, and the severity of the possible collision is determined on the basis of the determined change in velocity, wherein a mass (m2) of the other vehicle is estimated by means of the control apparatus on the basis of the sensor data, and the severity of the possible collision is additionally determined on the basis of the estimated mass (m2).

A seat adjustment system for a seat of a motor vehicle, including at least one motor driving the adjustment and at least one operating element, which can be actuated by an operator, for at least one adjustment function, and the actuation of which closes a switch provided in a line from the motor associated with the adjustment function to a power supply, wherein a relay is provided downstream of the switch to the motor in the line, said relay being open in the non-energized state, and the seat adjustment system has a control unit which is designed to close the relay when an operating element is actuated and there is no collision signal indicating a collision of the motor vehicle and leaves the relay open at least temporarily if there is a collision signal when an operating element is actuated.

The present invention is a vehicle control device including a restriction unit configured to restrict a change in an orientation of a vehicle seat, a vehicle information recognition unit configured to recognize information of a traveling environment of a vehicle, a risk evaluation unit configured to evaluate a risk of a collision which may occur in the vehicle on the basis of the traveling environment recognized by the vehicle information recognition unit, and a control unit configured to control the restriction unit and restrict the change in the orientation of the vehicle seat on the basis of a level of the risk of the collision evaluated by the risk evaluation unit.

A motion sickness mitigation method for the purposes of mitigating motion sickness of a vehicle occupant travelling in a motor vehicle includes moving at least a portion of a backrest, a portion of a seat squab, a portion of a head restraint, a portion of an armrest and/or a portion of a footrest as a function of a detected and/or an anticipated driving situation of the motor vehicle, in each case proceeding from a starting position in at least one spatial direction. The movement is situational on the basis of an actual or anticipated trajectory of the motor vehicle.

A vehicle seat includes a lock-to-neutral-position mechanism that locks a seat cushion at a neutral position, and an immediate lock mechanism that locks the seat cushion immediately at a current position when locking is required. A steering sensor senses a steering angle and a steering angular velocity. The immediate lock mechanism performs the locking when the steering angle is large, whereas the lock-to-neutral-position mechanism performs the locking when the steering velocity is high. When the steering wheel is at the neutral position, the locking by the immediate lock mechanism is released and the locking is switched over to the lock-to-neutral-position mechanism that is in a lock ready state.

A vehicle seat structure includes a vehicle seat including a seat cushion and a seatback, and a pushing apparatus provided inside the seatback at a predetermined height. The pushing apparatus includes a pushing portion that, at a time of a vehicle collision in which an occupant sitting on the vehicle seat moves to a seat forward side, pushes a portion of a seat front face of the seatback to the seat forward side.

A system and method are provided for controlling an interior configuration of a vehicle. The system may include an interior vehicle component, an actuator component configured to adjust a physical configuration of the interior vehicle component, an external communication component configured to collect driving environment data representing an external environment of the vehicle, and one or more processors configured to receive driving environment data and detect, by processing the driving environment data, an external driving condition. When the one or more processors detect the external driving condition, the one or more processors may cause the actuator component to adjust the interior vehicle component from a first physical configuration to a second physical configuration, or may cause the actuator component to restrict movement of the interior vehicle component to a predetermined range of physical configurations.