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BIA-Brukerstyrt innovasjonsarena

Next Generation CMS (Crash Management System)

Alternative title: Neste generasjon støtfangersystem i aluminium

Awarded: NOK 16.0 mill.

Benteler Automotive Raufoss AS (BAR) supplies bumper systems in aluminium to all leading car manufacturers in Europe. Stricter requirements to the crash safety of bumper systems from the EU have recently increased the complexity of the system. The purpose of these requirements is to make the car less aggressive for the counterpart in meeting accidents, while at the same time protecting the cars passengers. This requires a higher precision in the manufacturing process of the individual components of the bumper system to ensure that the assembled part can meet strict requirements. The "Next generation CMS" project has an ambition to make BAR more competitive by improving and streamlining important steps in the production process. The first innovation area of the project is to enhance efficiency in solution heat treatment of aluminium components to be formed, by investigating adequate booster heating methods that can bring the profiles to desired temperature in a shorter time. The second innovation objective is to investigate how use of advanced tool coatings, if required in combination with new environment-friendly lubricants, can facilitate reduced use of the current expensive and less environmentally friendly lubricants in forming processes. A third large part of the research project is dedicated to developing novel forming processes to minimize assembly cost of CMS components. Increasing the use of digital tools in the product and process-development process is also an important innovation target to improve the engineering efficiency and accuracy in component design. During the first year of the project, extensive lab testing was performed to evaluate booster heating methods, to screen out different tool coating solutions, and to characterize aluminium properties in relevant forming and crash tempers. A simulation method to account for the through-process effects in component design is established. By simulating the manufacturing processes and the effect of the subsequent heat treatments, one can to a greater extent predict the crash performance of the end-product. The knowledge generated in this project is expected to contribute to developing new and robust production processes where the production costs are reduced without deteriorating the products performance and crash function.

The project shall develop and evaluate innovative solutions enabling the production of Next-generation Crash Management Systems, to meet more demanding requirements with the new ongoing market change in terms of final product performance (high energy absorption, high ductility for e.g. e-automotive) and integrated functions. Innovations addressed in the project shall enable more complex forming with tighter tolerances and with fewer parts in the final assembly. The only way to achieve this goal is to make parallel changes in different processes-steps of the manufacturing value chain (related to alloy heat treatment, forming and assembly). This is a challenging task, which requires a tight collaboration between industrial and research partners in the CMS project backed up by Research Council of Norway. Research will be performed to develop experimental and numerical methods/tools, providing a better control of complex interaction between materials, the manufacturing processes and product performance. A successful project will enable the industrial partner to shorten the existing manufacturing route, consequently reducing the production time and increasing the productivity in production lines and the competitiveness in their core markets.

Funding scheme:

BIA-Brukerstyrt innovasjonsarena