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Chassis Improvements

chassis improvementsmass reduction

Roll Cage:

The addition of a front bumper and the change from a standard metal rear bumper to a newly designed foam rear bumper forced a change in the shape of the roll cage. At the rear the roll cage will now mount directly onto the chassis rather than to the top of the rear bumper. The addition of bumpers was neccessary in order to fit into regulations but also to avoid damage to the chassis. Diagonal beams have been added at the top of the roll cage to fit in with scrutineering at the competition.

roll_cage.png

Rear Bumper and Bracket:

In order to attach the bumper and protect the vehicle more effectively from rear impact we are aiming to improve the rear bumper design. The first part of this is to mount it directly to the roll cage through a redsign of the bracket. These changes will be validated through FEA to ensure no unwanted deflections. As the bumper is now mounting directly to the roll cage as opposed to the back of the chassis it is important to ensure that the replacable brackets, made from aluminium, bend before the roll cage, protecting it. The bumper will be made from foam with a Tritek cover to improve impact resistance.


rear bumper new

rear bumper bracket new

Stub Axles:

The stub axles on the 2013 kart will be 20% lighter than the original Tony Kart parts. This will be achieved by removing excess material from the plate and hollowing out the main shaft. Made using EOS technology.

Stub Axle 2

Stub Axle 1

Side Pods:

Side pods have been designed to mount directly to our batter mount and nerf bar assembly. The plan is to construct these from an Polyurethane Foam core with a Tritek outer later. Tritec is a revolutionary new polypropylene composite, being researched at WMG, made up of woven sheets, it has high impact resistance and at certain ply can reach great stiffness. The sidepods will provide protection to the wheels and batteries from side impacts as well as giving space for sponsors to display information


Side pod outer

Side pod inner

Floor Panel:

Originally constructed of Steel a switch to Titanium, allowing a thinner panel to be used, could give weight savings of up to 400g.

floor panel

Foot Rest:

The current footrest is a heavy and complicated; consisting of six parts. A redesign consisting of only three parts can be made in tool steel and rapid prototyped by CES. This gives a total part weight of just 0.18kg. An alternative design would be a simple milled aluminium bar.

foot rest

Chain Guard:

By removing some of the unnecessary material from the chain guard and then switching to plastic from metal an 80% weight saving can be achieved.

chain guard

Tritek:

Tritek is a 100% Polypropylene composite, it is lightweight but also has excellent impact resistant properties. As such it has been heavily explored for use in applications where high impact resistance is required. Therefore we have looked at using Tritek for our protection components; front and rear bumpers and side pods. Layers of Tritek composite will be formed on a lightweight and collapsible polyurethane foam, called Puren. This combination will allow for a low density bumper that can absorb shock from impact to protect the kart.


First we will design the parts using SolidWorks to mimic the dimensions and impact characteristics of commercially available karting bumpers. Then we will fabricate these designs by machining the foam to the desired shape. The composite is cut to shape and laid upon the foam mould before vacuum forming. Before design and manufacture of our parts it was important to run tests to discover the minimum achievable radius for the layup to take to the mould. Static compression testing was also carried out to determine the number of layers needed for our designs to withstand the energy from a typical impact in the race.

tritek

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