The lightweighting of vehicles is an essential component for improving the energy efficiency of transport systems. Lighter vehicles consume less fuel and emit less pollutants and greenhouse gases. Moreover, more than just a choice, new lightweight materials are indispensable for electric or hybrid vehicles. The lightweighting of vehicles allows to decrease energy consumption, reduce assembly time and costs, and lower costs associated with building advanced traction parts.

Précicad and ITAQ develop a small ultra-lightweight electric vehicle
ITAQ has been working in collaboration with Précicad to create an ultra-lightweight electric vehicle designed for aluminum smelters. Made of aluminum, the new electric truck is twice as light and has twice the range of ordinary vehicles used to transport employees and to ensure the maintenance of big manufacturing plants. 

This technique allows to optimize the design of parts and structures, leading to a reduction in weight. 
 
The mechanical stress capacity must be determined for the proper sizing of parts. The experimental stress analysis, carried out with strain gauges, is a reliable and economic way of determining if a part is sufficiently resistant to overloads so as to avoid breakage. The technique also allows to validate the digital results obtained from the finite elements analysis (FEA).

Installation of strain gauges and measures for optimizing parts
Tenco (CDN) Ltée is a company specialized in the manufacturing of snow and ice removal equipment. “With a view to reducing production costs already in the design stage of this vehicle, we opted for an approach that seeks to minimize the quantity of steel used as much as possible. During the validation of the design with a finite elements analysis software, some portions of the structure were determined to be under critical strain,” said Vincent Alie, design technician and project manager at Tenco.

Thus, the mandate of ITAQ was to install the strain gauges as well as a data acquisition system in order to take measurements under different load levels.

“The tests realized in collaboration with the personnel of ITAQ have allowed to confirm the nature of those efforts, both in the zones where the stresses were elevated as well as in those where they were acceptable. The tests allowed to avoid having to make the vehicle unnecessarily robust while ensuring sufficient robustness for the functions it was designed to carry out,” concluded Mr. Alie. 

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Robert Hydraulique Inc. is a manufacturer of hydraulic ladders. Robert Desrosiers, president of Robert Hydraulique, explains: “We test all our ladders under load to ensure that they are secure. The experimental stress analysis using gauges has allowed us to go further by targeting and quantifying our real capacities. We can thus be sure that our theoretical models are valid and that they optimize the weight of our products without compromising safety. In our field, safety is primordial and theoretical predictions are not always sufficient. The experimental stress analysis was thus a perfect complement to the other practical tests that we conduct on our products.”

A technological mission organized by ITAQ and supported by the MDEIE allowed businesses engaged in sustainable transport to participate in the last EVS, which took place in Norway from May 12 to 15, 2009. Every year, the EVS unites transport experts from all over the world and presents the latest technologies in the fields of electric traction, energy efficiency and GHG reduction. The lightweighting of vehicles was this year’s symposium theme:

The three big Japanese automobile manufacturers interested in carbon fibre
The Toyota 1/X concept car in carbon fibre 
Amory Lovins, president and scientific director of the Rocky Mountain Institute, presents new trends in the automobile sector, in particular Toyota’s new concept car. “This is the most important concept vehicle at the time,” declared Mr. Lovins. The 1/X has as much interior space as a Prius but weighs only 1/3 of its weight, and consumes 50% less gasoline.

Major investments in carbon fibre
Toray Industries, the global leader in carbon fibre, announced an investment of 30 billion Yen in research leading to the mass production of carbon fiber automobile parts for Toyota. Honda and Nissan are following in those footsteps, with investments in the companies Mitsubishi Rayon as well as Toray.

The marketing of advanced powertrain systems has been slow to catch on given the high development costs. However, the above effort could give a serious boost to these systems, especially given their cost-efficiency over the long run: Twice as light as conventional vehicles, they need two to three times less battery capacity.

Bright Automotive Inc. unveils its hybrid truck made of composite materials and aluminum
At the EVS-24, BRIGHT Automotive Inc unveiled its all new utility truck that burns only 2.4 litres per 100 km and combining composite materials and aluminum with a plug-in hybrid propulsion. The company plans to have built 50,000 units by 2012. <