Design and manufacture of automotive components in thermoplastic composite (Part I)

Abstract

Due to the increasing demands in environment regulations related to gases emissions, the automotive sector has gradually increased the plastic consumption in vehicles.The objective is to introduce in the market structural components made in latest generation composite materials in a serial and competitive way with the functionality of the present metallic parts. In this work the redesign of two automotive metallic components that will be produced via thermoplastic RTM (Part II) is presented. This technology allows the manufacturing of high performance long fibre composite materials with shorter cycle times. Based on the specifications of the components and the actual metallic solutions performance a new concept of a brake pedal and a control arm consistent with the manufacturing via a RTM thermoplastic process is adressed. For the calculations of both components, carbon or glass fibre with poliamide matrix (APA6) based solutions are used.