Carbon fiber this, carbon fiber that, you hear this word on an almost daily basis. Carbon fibre composite are the new wonder material, combining properties of lightness and strength that were here to fore unobtainable, even undreamt of, just decades ago. No wonder we can find them in products ranging from badminton racquets to the most advanced fighter jets. But as it stands today, composite manufacturing is a laborious and costly process that doesn’t lend itself well to current mass-production techniques. This is the major reason properly made composite products command a price premium. While there are copycat products out on the market that are surprisingly cheap, they do not have the longevity and reliability of composites that were made according to the exacting standards required by the material.

Producing lightweight, strong and dimensionally stable composite components requires a deep understanding of the properties of carbon fiber. Properly oriented and cured, CFRP parts exhibit the very qualities that have made them the material of choice for a huge variety of applications. However, fabricators and manufacturers whose only motivation is a fat bottom line have given composites a bad rap because the products they turn out are the ones subject to sudden catastrophic failure that can even pose a risk to one’s life. An example of this is poorly-designed bicycle parts that can cause a crash due to breaking without prior warning.

Structures for automotive applications need to be extremely reliable for a wide variety of reasons. At the same time, they need to lend themselves to mass production techniques if they are to become commercially viable for the world’s carmakers. Sure, Lamborghini, McLaren and other exotic car manufacturers produce cars with a high carbon fiber content, but then only the very rich can afford them. Mainly because of tightening safety, fuel consumption and emissions regulations, automakers are looking to composites to help them comply with these requirements. Lighter cars need smaller engines, which in turn use less fuel and emit less harmful emissions. At the same time, carbon fibre composites can produce safer vehicles because of their higher strength ratios, compared to steel.

Unseen by the world at large, there are now dozens of vehicle prototypes running around that use composite structures. And we don’t mean exotic sports cars or Formula 1 racers. Traditionally, a prototype would have used steel in its developmental cycle in order to validate various new technologies, layouts and designs. But to develop lightweight cars with alternative drivetrains (e.g. hybrids), it is important to design and develop a composite chassis with an eye toward producing it at an acceptable cost, both for the manufacturer and the buying public. For now, it is a given that composite solutions will increase the cost of the vehicles. However, new techniques that do not use infusion or autoclaving have been developed. By bonding carbon fiber honeycomb panels together, designers and engineers alike hope to lower cost, improve production times and make a cost-effective carbon fibre composite product all at the same time.

For more information related to this please visit:
http://www.superleggera.com.au/

To add a comment please login by clicking here