Multi-material design of a vehicle body considering crashworthiness safety and social effects

Abstract

In the vehicle design, crashworthiness safety has always been a crucial issue; also, social effects are currently attracting much attention for a sustainable-development and friend environment. This study develops and performs a multi-material design for a vehicle body considering both crashworthiness safety and social effects. Numerical vehicle crash models for full-front impact, side impact, off-front impact and roof crush were established and validated according to relevant vehicle test laws. Crashworthiness and social-effect (i.e. weight, cost, manufacture and recycle) objectives with the analytical factors of the vehicle body were defined. Design materials (including both metals and composite materials) were adopted. Uniform design with non-linear normalisation method was utilised for the analysis of the crashworthiness simulation responses. Technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) with the accident-data analysis-based weight ratios was applied for the material design of the vehicle body under multiple objectives. The results show that, when considering both crashworthiness safety and social effects, the composite materials are advantageous for applying to the energy-absorption components; also, different materials have their unique edges in different sections of a vehicle body. This investigation provides a series of useful data for the multi-material design of the vehicle body in engineering.