This paper describes the objectives and main features of the French car driving simulator for research applications, called SARA project. Requested by the French Transport and Safety Research Institute (INRETS) and the two French car manufacturers (PEUGEOT S.A and RENAULT) this simulator allows:

-Safe and accurate evaluation of driver's attitude in various situations,

-Accurate traffic engineering research,

-Engineering evaluation of vehicle design.

This simulator is a technological state of the art design, as far as it incorporates :

-A specific motion system including a 6 DOF motion platform on top of a large X-Y linear displacement system and a specific vibration device,

-A wide field of view visual system including a 180 front field of view and rear view mirror scene displays. This system is based on a Computer Image Generator and a collimated display system,

-A specific software and database development center allowing the preparation of real time experiments and analysis of their results.

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Michel Lacroix