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Research, development, and demonstration of environmentally and economically responsible and sustainable recovery options for plastics from end-of-life vehicles (ELVs) is an active area of study. The plastics industry has been researching a variety of mechanical recycling, feedstock recycling, energy/fuel recovery, and reuse options for post-use automotive plastics. This paper reports on recent commercial experience and test programs using automotive shredder residue (ASR) containing post-use automotive plastics as an environmentally sound energy source in modern waste-to-energy plants. Commercial experience in Europe, especially Germany and Switzerland, is highlighted. A major test program cosponsored by the Association of Plastics Manufacturers in Europe (APME) and the American Plastics Council (APC) has recently demonstrated that co-firing ASR with municipal solid waste (MSW) can be carried out in compliance with strict German air emissions and ash management regulations.

Materials used for automotive interiors are changing due to the addition of PSIR integral systems. The placement of these PSIR invisible systems on the upper IP has introduced additional significant performance criteria, both safety and functional, on the materials being chosen for coverstocks. In this paper, the main new materials will be reviewed. This will include: vacuum formable TPO and PVC/ABS, slush moldable PVC, TPU, and TPOs, as well as spray polyurethane systems. The advantages and disadvantages of each will be discussed as well as testing data available.

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Today, the challenge for a supplier involved in energy absorption consists in proposing modular systems able to adress many different specifications. To achieve this goal, one must take into consideration the whole specification. Two solutions are described : one using hybrid thermoplastic composites beam working in bending, the other using padding systems working in compression on a stiff member between two front rails. The two solutions are compared in terms of performances, costs and weight

Robust design approaches can be applied to create designs that are insensitive to input variation so that they work almost all the time, regardless of manufacturing and operating conditions. In this paper, the performances of two automotive designs - a steering column and a deck lid system - are significantly improved by using the robust design approach through mathematical optimization. For each design, calculation of the performance indices, the formulation, and results of the optimization problem are presented.

The objective of this paper is to determine the whirling bending critical speeds of pultruded composite shafts in simply supported boundary conditions. Theoretical studies have been carried using Patran to determine the natural frequencies and the mode shapes for the Jeffcot and Kikuchi rigid rotor models. A tabletop experimental apparatus has been fabricated and the bending critical speeds have been measured for various span lengths between the supports. The results of this study may be useful in identifying whether pultruded composite shafts can be employed as drive shafts in automotive or other industries.

Design for Manufacture has been applied within the automotive industry. However, high-quality and low cost of production has not been achieved. A preliminary methodology has been established to prevent losing time and cost of production. A structural system has been constructed to provide all aspects of the design that are needed to enable manufacture on the shop floor. This system is aimed at providing advice on the manufacturability at an early stage of the design. It is the intention of this paper to present a preliminary methodology and the benefit of the system will be outline. This research is being carried out at Coventry University and funded by late Mr. Wagimin Suhargianto in Indonesia.

This article describes the application of multiphysics simulation in the automotive industry. Multiphysics simulation uses a single computational framework for modeling multiple interacting physical phenomena. Within the multiphysics framework, the finite element treatment of fluid flow is based on the Galerkin-Least-Squares (GLS) method, while the arbitrary-Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) method is utilized to account for deformable fluid domains. The finite element treatment of solids and structures is based on the Hu-Washizu variational principle. Interaction constraints are enforced in a fully-coupled manner using the augmented-Lagrangian method. Automatically generated tetrahedral grids are used to ease and expedite the analysis process. This multiphysics architecture lends itself naturally to high-performance parallel computing. Several applications are presented which demonstrate the utility and accuracy of this approach in automotive component design.

Bumper engineers at the OEMs and Tier One suppliers are faced with the challenge of designing economical and lightweight bumper systems that are compatible with current styling trends. This paper is aimed at helping North American bumper engineers meet the challenge. There is a wide range of high-strength and ultra high strength bumper steels available. Many of these steels were not in the marketplace as recently as five years ago. These steels are reviewed as well as appropriate manufacturing methods for converting them into bumper facebars and reinforcing beams. Leading edge bumper beam examples are given. Steel, aluminum and composite reinforcing beams are compared from the weight (mass) point of view. Bumper systems incorporating beams made from these materials are also compared from the manufacturing cost and repair cost points of view.

Previous work has shown that mirror bright stainless steel clad to lightweight aluminum offers an optimum combination of weight, appearance, fabricability, styling, and durability against road damage and corrosion for automotive trim and bumper applications. This paper characterizes the properties of stainless steel-aluminum clad bumper materials for application on Class 8 trucks. The rule of mixtures is confirmed for an SAE 30301 stainless steel clad to 3003 aluminum, and is applied to show the tradeoffs between weight, strength, and cost that affect material selection for truck bumpers. The fabricability is demonstrated by sweeping, aerodynamic bumper designs that are readily formed, and is quantified by forming limit diagrams of 301SS / 3003Al clad and 301 stainless steel. The durability against road damage is demonstrated with Gravelometer testing, followed by ASTM standardized corrosion testing. The clad is also resistant to erosion from water impingement.

A 2D finite element program, known as FAST_FORM2D, was developed at FTI to carry out section analysis in die design. Incremental method is employed and plane strain condition is assumed for 2D sections. Contact behavior and friction force are simulated by a developed algorithm. Therefore, the divergence problems related to the conventional contact techniques can be reduced or avoided. An adaptive mesh generation scheme is implemented to achieve computation efficiency. With the code, it is possible to evaluate tension, strain, thickness distributions and punch force at different stages for any 2D section cut from 3D panels. User can easily input or modify forming conditions to get the best solution.

This paper is concerned with the use of solid elements in sheet metal forming simulation, particularly springback prediction for flanging when the flanging radii are comparable with the metal thickness. It is demonstrated that appropriate solid elements must be used instead of shell elements in order to obtain adequate results. Numerical difficulties associated with development of suitable solid elements are discussed in detail, with emphasis on the volumetric locking and transverse shear locking phenomena respectively. The transverse shear locking arises from the incompatible deformation modes when the element is used for thin structure bending analysis. A four point bending testing problem is used to study the performances of different solid elements. A locking-free solid element based on assumed strain formulation is developed in Ford in-house program MTLFRM for accurate springback prediction, and a flanging example is given to demonstrate its application.

The consumption of blow molded bumpers for passenger vehicles is increasing, particularly for small to mid-size vehicles. The performance required for bumpers in this class of vehicles varies by geographic region, as “global” vehicles are increasingly specified outside of the United States. For this reason, it is important to understand the impact performance provided by materials that could be blow molded into bumpers for this class of vehicles. This paper will compare the relative performance of polycarbonate/polybutylene terephthalate (PC/PBT) alloys vs. polyolefins for impact protection, weight, and processing performance.

The primary purpose of an automotive bumper is to protect the vehicle from damage, which may otherwise result from a low speed impact. Major insurance companies typically conduct low speed crash tests of new vehicles in order to establish appropriate insurance classifications based on the estimated costs to repair the resulting damage. One such test, which is carried out by the Allianz insurance organisation, has become the European standard by which automobile insurance rates are set. Although commonly known as the Allianz test, it may be more specifically referred to as the Danner test, after Max Danner, the originator of the test. This test is conducted at 15 km/h with a 0° oriented rigid barrier overlapping 40% of the vehicle for frontal collisions and a 1000 kg moveable barrier with a 40% overlap for impacts to the rear of the vehicle.

Automotive styling trends point to reduced bumper overhang, greater sweeps, and reduced overall package space for the bumper system. At the same time engineers are charged with improving bumper performance to reduce collision repair costs and enhance occupant safety further. Two key performance parameters for the bumper to meet these conflicting objectives are fast but controlled loading and efficient energy absorption (EA). The majority of today's North American passenger-car bumper systems consist of a reinforcing bar either of steel, aluminum, or composite construction, and an energy absorption media. The most widely used energy-absorber construction is made from an expanded-polypropylene foam (EPP). Honeycomb energy absorbers, which are made from an ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) copolymer, are also still used on some of today's cars. This paper will address an alternative to the bumper energy absorber systems described above.

The I-Section bumper design has evolved over the past 10 years into a lightweight, low cost, high performance alternative to traditional bumper beams. Initial I-Section Bumpers were developed with 40% Chopped fiberglass GMT. Through the development of lower cost Mineral-Filled/Chopped fiberglass GMT, improved static load and dynamic impact performance results have been achieved in I-Section Bumper Designs.

An integrated pressure sensor is presented which uses a custom digital signal processor and non-volatile memory to calibrate and temperature compensate a family of pressure sensor elements for a wide range of automotive applications. Unlike previously introduced analog solutions, this programmable signal conditioning engine operates in the digital domain utilizing a calibration algorithm that accounts for higher order effects beyond the realm of most analog signal conditioning approaches, and provides enhanced features that typically were implemented off-chip (or not at all) with traditional analog signal conditioning solutions that use laser or electronic trimming. A specially developed digital communication interface permits calibration of the individual sensor module via connector pins after the module has been fully assembled and encapsulated.

There has been an increasing interest in developing a reliable sensor to guard automotive DC motors from an unexpected current surge. We have developed self-resettable positive temperature coefficient (PTC) sensors from two polymer PTC material systems for this purpose. One is a polyolefin based conductive material which provides a switch temperature of around 125°C. The other is a polyamide based material with a higher switch temperature of 165°C for applications where ambient temperature is typically higher. Presented herein are operation principles and material PTC characteristics of the newly developed self-resettable protection sensors. Performance of these sensors is also discussed.

The best features of a comb and ring device have been combined to provide an improved micromachined angular rate sensor. The use of differential combs attached to a centrally supported ring gives this electroformed surface micromachine improved signal output and temperature performance. Previous results have been reported for vibratory ring sensors vacuum packaged in solder sealed CERDIPs. Bulk silicon etching and wafer to wafer bonding, used to fabricate millions of pressure sensors and accelerometers each year, have been employed to vacuum package this new CMOS integrated micromachine. Wafer level packaging allows for MEMS chip-scale packaging at the board level. The goal of this project is to develop a low cost sensor capable of reliably functioning at temperatures between -40 °C and 85 °C. The design, modeling, process, package, performance and automotive applications of this sensor will be covered.

This paper relates to a distance detecting sensor, specifically a scan radar laser used for a vehicle distance warning system or an intelligent cruise control system. In developing the scan laser radar, we used a light-based scan-action system working via an electromagnetic actuator and ICs in place of the internal circuitry for substantial parts count reduction. The compact scan laser radar is smaller in size and lower in price with higher performance than its predecessors (1). This has made it possible to offer a lower-priced, compact, lightweight, and easy-to-install scan laser radar.