Modelling and FE Simulation of HVC Using Multi Objective Response Surface Optimization Techniques

The purpose of an automotive chassis is to maintain the shape of the vehicle and bear the various loads that are applied to the vehicle. The structure typically accounts for a large portion of the development and production costs of the new vehicle program, and the designer has many different structural concepts available. Choosing the best is important to ensure acceptable structural performance under other design constraints, such as cost, volume and method of production, product application, and more. The material selection for chassis depends upon various factors like lightness, economy, safety, recyclability, and circulation of life. The current study aims to perform optimization of the design of a heavy vehicle chassis using central composite design & optimal space fill design scheme (s) with the material tested is Al6092/SiC/17.5p MMC. Different design points are generated using design of experiments. The equivalent stress, deformation and mass are evaluated for each design points. The CAD modelling and FE simulation of heavy motor vehicle chassis is conducted using ANSYS software. From the optimization conducted on chassis design, response surface plots of equivalent stress, deformation and mass are generated which enabled to determine the range of dimensions for which these parameters are maximum or minimum. The use of Discontinuously Reinforced Aluminium-Matrix Composites Al6092/SiC/17.5p MMC aided to reduce weight of chassis by 66.25% and 66.68% by using CCD and Optimal space fill design scheme respectively, without much reduction in strength of chassis.