Dogs get the Crash Test Dummies Treatment
Sleepypod®, a Pasadena-based company known for reinventing pet products through innovative design, today announces it has expanded its family of proprietary crash test pets with the addition of two next-generation crash test dogs.
DASH 1.0 and DUKE 3.0 join nine crash test dogs and cats designed and built in-house by Sleepypod’s research and development team to create safer pet products
“Crash test pets are critical for testing Sleepypod’s car safety restraints throughout the product design process so that we can expose possible flaws that could compromise the safety of a pet in a car crash,” says Michael Leung, Sleepypod co-founder and lead product designer.
“Sleepypod’s crash test pets take the hard knocks in crash-testing as part of Sleepypod’s Safety Test Program to help keep pets and the humans who ride with them safer in cars,” says Leung.
DASH 1.0
DASH 1.0 is the first Sleepypod crash test dummy that represents the distinctive sighthound dog shape, having long legs, a deep chest, a wiry body, and a lean head. DASH’s weight is evenly distributed and adaptable from 75 to 90 pounds. An articulated waist and legs flex DASH’s steel skeleton.
A point-of-view camera in DASH’s neck records crash test footage, while a g-force sensor records the overall pressure on DASH in a collision.
DUKE 3.0
DUKE 3.0 is the third Sleepypod crash test dummy representing a German Shepherd dog. DUKE’s weight is evenly distributed and adaptable from 75 to 90 pounds.
Like his 2.0 predecessor, DUKE 3.0 has a steel skeleton with an articulating waist and legs. The DUKE iterations differ in the instrumentation that measures the force on the crash test dog. A g-force sensor records the overall pressure on the new DUKE 3.0 in a collision.
In contrast, load cells measure the compression on the earlier DUKE 2.0’s chest.
