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I think its a very cool idea, but the amount of weight saving doesn't really seem that much and I think a cast thin-wall metallic version(Magnesium or Aluminum) might cost less? Unless they figured out to layup a relatively complicated structure like that with a cheap process somehow?
Cool idea though.
Last edited by mx_tifoso on 14 Apr 2010, 20:03, edited 1 time in total.
Reason:Edited title to reflect two topics merged togethed and content.
Carbon fiber has been used in many exotic applications in cars but I’ve never seen a carbon fiber damper before! Unlike the Bose suspension system which is exotic in its own complicated way, ZF Sachs basically just aims at reducing weight with this new ultralight carbon fiber damper designed for use in A-segment cars.
It only weighs half the weight of today’s aluminum lightweight damper. Partially sprung and unsprung masses are reduced too, which according to ZF Sachs leads to better ride comfort.
According to ZF Sachs’ Head of the Powertrain and Suspension Components Dr. Peter Ottenbruch, the damper design is realistic in terms of feasibility and cost analysis and can easily be transferred to volume production.
Could we see carbon fiber dampers be used in premium A-segment cars like the upcoming BMW Megacity range of front wheel drive microcars?
to me this sounds like :
oh we have found out carbonfibre is a the ways to reduce weight in the car..
what a rubbish.
I see no justification to try and do anything in Carbonfibre on a mass production car.
the fact you could put it into production does not mean you´d have to .surely we need
to get to lighter cars ,but it would make a lot more sense to reduce the amount of parts going into a car to achieve weight reduction.
the claim to outweigh the additional material cost by having less parts to mount
seems like a joke to me ,a current Mcpherson strut is produced using a handful of steelpressings and 1 lets call it precisision tube welded up ...
Personally I don't necessarily buy it that it can be cheap enough to be practical. But maybe they have some advanced manufacturing method for complex composite structure that we don't know about....
As far as it being a way of making damper goes, its just a material. They already make carbon tubes, rods...etc. Damper is just a tubular pressure vessel. Nothing particularly ground breaking there.
Personally I don't necessarily buy it that it can be cheap enough to be practical. But maybe they have some advanced manufacturing method for complex composite structure that we don't know about....
As far as it being a way of making damper goes, its just a material. They already make carbon tubes, rods...etc. Damper is just a tubular pressure vessel. Nothing particularly ground breaking there.
as we can see frm the pics ,they shy away from a full carbon piece ,but instead have metal inserts bushings sleeves...not very advanced..
As far as that goes, I think you want to use homogenized material as bearing surface anyway. Composite is a structure, the weave and loadpath gives it strength. I am sure even carbon flexture F1 suspension still uses metal spacers for bolt interfaces....
I think its a very cool idea, but the amount of weight saving doesn't really seem that much and I think a cast thin-wall metallic version(Magnesium or Aluminum) might cost less? Unless they figured out to layup a relatively complicated structure like that with a cheap process somehow?
Cool idea though.
To manufacture something like that at low cost, they probably need to do a dry layup and then use injection molding. A cast or forged aluminum version seem cheaper though, but I guess they wouldn't show such a part unless they think it is somehow realistic to produce it.
hey...
looking at this part it does not look even remotely like a optimised part..constant
wall thickness everywhere but the joints.. this is hardly a good design .sharp transitions towards the hub tube no radii there...it looks more like a billet machined part then something coming out of resin/prepreg ,injection moulding process,right?
the pic cannot be more than a teaser,not the real deal.
where is the sense of using prohibitively priced raw materials and then you produce outer shapes you could machine with half decent CNC equipment..
in that one they praise themselves for inventing composite leafsprings.. oh my dear have they seen a Corvette in the last decades???
also suddenly speach is of glassfibre reinforced not carbon...
the whole story is ,well, made up ... but ok they started the project in 2009 for possible series production starting in 2015..Automotive development is not that quick i had to learn..
Well its made by ZF so it doesn't really surprise me.
(I know some people working there)
Maybe they don't have anybody there with proper knowledge about Composite designs.
mep wrote:Well its made by ZF so it doesn't really surprise me.
(I know some people working there)
Maybe they don't have anybody there with proper knowledge about Composite designs.
the german buzzword for this would be: Praktikum (trainee/internship)I guess..
