HEADLINES
Alphanumeric Soup Spells Out Revised Wheelchair Standards
New requirements for manufacturers of
wheelchair tiedown and occupant restraint systems (WTORS) and new training oppor- tunities for transporters of children with disabilities will be required later this year when revised standards take effect. Section 19, or WC19, is the voluntary
standard for designing, testing, and label- ing wheelchairs for use as seats in motor vehicles completed in 2000 by a working group of the RESNA Wheelchair Standards Committee. Te revised WC19 requires a five-point, wheelchair-integrated restraint harness for children weighing less than 50 pounds, similar to child safety restraints, according to Dr. Larry Schneider, the chair of the RESNA Committee on Wheelchairs and Transportation and director of the RERC on Wheelchair Transportation Safety. Te permanently-attached and labeled
securement points and other structural members of the wheelchair must withstand the forces of a 30-mph (48-kph), 20-g impact during a frontal-impact sled test compara- ble to that required by FMVSS 213 for child safety seats. Wheelchairs for smaller children must also have high back/head supports. Currently, WC19 does not allow “signs of
structural failure” of primary load-carrying components. Te new criteria will be less restrictive in that primary load-carrying components must completely fail for the wheelchair to fail the frontal crash test. Previous limitations on wheelchair size and mass that can comply with WC19 have also been removed, but manufacturers must warn customers that not all sizes and masses are compatible with motor vehicle travel. WC19 will continue to require that wheel-
chairs provide four structural points for securement using a four-point, strap-type tiedown. Tese securement points must comply with specific geometry that will ac- cept securement-strap end-fitting hooks. Te wheelchairs must now be designed
to allow for easy and proper placement of vehicle-mounted occupant safety belts with the lap belt positioned low on the oc- cupant’s pelvis and in good contact with
the body. Te current version of WC19 only requires that a single rating of seat belt accommodation is determined for a wheel- chair, and the rating must be disclosed in the manufacturer’s pre-sale literature. However, two ratings of seat belt accom-
modation will be required in WC19, one for the “ease” of properly positioning a vehicle- anchored seatbelt and a second for the degree to which proper positioning of the seatbelt on the occupant can be achieved. Both ratings must be at least “acceptable” for the wheelchair to comply with WC19. In addition, WC19-compliant wheel-
chairs must continue to provide anchor points for the optional use of a wheel- chair-anchored pelvic belt designed to withstand occupant loading in a 30-mph, 20-g frontal impact. Tis wheelchair-an- chored pelvic-belt restraint must include standardized (i.e., pin-bushing) attach- ment points on each half for connecting a vehicle-anchored shoulder belt near the occupant’s hip, thereby comprising an ef- fective three-point belt-restraint system. But, just as the meaning of WC19 has
started to catch on, Schneider said there will be two new acronyms for special-ed transporters to learn. WC18 is an updated version of Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) Recommended Practice J2249, “Wheelchair Tiedown and Occupant Re- straint Systems for Use in Motor Vehicles.” As with SAE J2249, WC18 will require that a WTORS is dynamically tested in the same 30-mph, 20-g, frontal-impact sled test conducted with a 170-pound, mid-size adult male crash-test dummy seated in a 187-pound surrogate wheelchair. Tree years after the publication of WC18,
WTORS manufacturers must conduct a separate and more severe test of wheel- chair tie-down/securement systems with the crash-test dummy restrained by a pelvic belt anchored to the surrogate wheelchair. WTORS manufacturers were working on developing and testing wheelchair tiedowns to comply with this new requirement. Schneider said WC20 will evaluate
24 School Transportation News Magazine May 2011
wheelchair seating systems for use in motor vehicles independently from the commer- cial wheelchair frames. WC20 evaluates the 30-mph frontal-impact crashworthiness of seating systems by installing a complete seating system, comprised of a seat, a back support and attachment hardware on a re- usable surrogate wheelchair frame (SWCF). Te initial version of WC20 will not apply
to seating systems with separate seating-sys- tem frames and, therefore, does not apply to seating systems with belt-restraint anchor points or wheelchair securement points. WC20 evaluates a seating system’s accom- modation of the proper use and positioning of vehicle-anchored lap/shoulder belts and rates seating systems for both the ease of proper belt positioning and the extent to which proper belt positioning is achieved. Both ratings must be at least “acceptable” for a seating system to comply. Both WC18 and WC19 will directly im-
pact WTORS manufacturers, such as Besi/ Tie-Tech and Q’Straint/Sure-Lok, as well as wheelchair manufacturers. “That will require us to re-evaluate
the strengths that we have on the tiedowns,” said Ed Cardona, senior inno- vation engineer for Q’Straint/Sure-Lok. “We need to look from a bigger scope at what kind of strengths are we looking for in order to meet these load require- ments that are expected.” Te changes will require new training on
how the tiedowns work and the wheelchair manufacturers must understand how the standards will work in unison. “It’s very important for us that the
wheelchair manufacturers understand the specifications for WC19 that crash- tested lap belts should be part of their wheelchairs,” Cardona said. “Te more people you have that understand this, the better off we’re going to be.” ■
Editor’s note — Dr. Larry Schneider will present the new and revised wheelchair standards at the STN EXPO in Reno, Nev. For more information, visit
www.stnexpo.com.
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