NVH Performance Optimization of Full Vehicles in Automotive 2012-01-1525

There are various optimization tools available on the market and they are successfully used for improving vehicle component designs in terms of performance and light weight [6][7][9][10]. But when it comes to full vehicle optimization, optimization tools are only one aspect of the entire process.

To build up a FEM Model for NVH analysis the assembly process and load case definition play an important role. Both steps are very complex and the chance to make mistakes is very high. After initial analysis the results has to be interpreted to understand the NVH behavior and detect optimization potential. Diagnostic tools could be used to determine modal or panel participation factors or do transfer path analysis. Then components or subsystems could be optimized using numerical optimization tools. For this step often super elements are used to reduce calculation time without losing too much of accuracy. As a full vehicle often contains of many single super elements the handling is also an important point. A basic precondition for optimization is that the analysis model has to be of good quality to achieve realistic optimization results. Check routines in the Preprocessing and in the solver make sure that model errors are detected.

A vertical process solution had been created to address these challenges in full vehicle NVH optimization. This will be shown on practical examples.