Abstract
CFK lightweight components in Steering Columns
Fuel reduction, new cars concepts like different kind of hybrid concepts, hydrogen fuel cell, E-cars are the actual trend in the automotive industry caused among other things like the new European law regulations to emit less CO2 and there for help the environmental situation to get a bit greener. Europe and China have a leading position, where the European trend is focussed on all different concepts mentioned above and the Chinese prefer the electro-cars development. Due to the short cruising range of battery today, lightweight design can be one necessary issue for saving energy.
This study investigates the possibilities of using carbon fibre materials (CFK) for steering columns components in passenger vehicles and light commercial vehicles. The weight reduction potential is up to 50-60 percent regarding steel and 20-30 percent regarding aluminium. CFK is nowadays used in all kind of sport cars with low production volumes. Mass production with CFK is not known in the chassis frame today because of the high cost for material, high manual operation and production time and so the high final price. The car makers are spending up to 100 Euro per kilogram saving, depending on the component weight reduction and the physically place in the car. So this issue looks interesting from the commercial side.
Steering columns are safety components and need to fulfil special quality issues, life time durability requirements (e.g. under temperature profile) and crash performance. Nevertheless, design and production to cost for low mass (50-100´000) and high mass production (>500´000) will be the big challenges to get the foot down in passengers cars.
Keywords: Automotive Industry, Lightweight design, CFK, CO2 Emission, Electro-Mobility