Road Safety Thailand Road Safety Policy Foundation (RSPF) revealed that one of the most common types of truck accidents is side collision that occurred in reversal situation or nighttime. In response to this fact, some truck manufacturers had installed a lateral underrun protection device (LUPD).  However, this device has not been in widespread use and currently there is no regulated standard for its design and performance.

One solution was to adopt the UN ECE R73 (Lateral underrun protection device standard) for developing the side-collision equipment. A conceptual design process with morphological matrix had been employed to consider all sub-functions of the LUPD. Then, an engineering analysis had been performed conforming to UN R73 test.  The design of LUPD must comply with the following conditions.      

• The strength is consistent with UN R73.
• The device must be manufactured from local materials.
• The manufacturing process could be performed by all manufacturer, large or small.
• Total cost of LUPD is lower than those imported.

This work has produced various engineering drawings of LUPD in accordance with UN R73 that can be manufactured for use. It can be used as a guideline for designing side-collision part for truck manufacturer, thus improving competitiveness of Thai entrepreneurs. Moreover, this work provided the drafting guideline of LUPD production, installation, and inspection.  It is expected that this work will lead to reduced violence of injury and death from road traffic accidents.