LAUSR

Abstract For ecological and economic reasons, the main goals in the automotive industry are the reduction of fuel consumption and the CO2 emissions of future car generations. On most cars with combustion engines produced today, the body accounts for one of the largest shares by weight, which has a leverage effect on the weight of the other vehicle components. Reducing the weight of the car body is thus very important for reducing climate-damaging CO2 emissions. Standard composites are highly advantageous in terms of their weight and mechanical properties but very cost-intensive due to the need for manual processing. A promising approach for the automated, large scale production of lightweight car structures with a high stiffness-to-weight ratio is the combination of high strength steel alloys and CFRP prepregs in a hybrid material – fiber metal laminate (FML) – which can be further processed by forming technologies such as deep drawing. FML consists of two sheet-metal top layers with a CFRP core. With this layer structure, the forming process can be simplified by comparison to the forming of standard composite material. The CFRP patches are chambered within the top layers and do not come into contact with the tool surfaces. The forming of fiber metal laminates is significantly more cost-efficient than the forming of standard composite materials. In current research being conducted by the Chair of Forming and Machining Technology (LUF) at the University of Paderborn, manufacturing processes are being developed for the production of high strength automotive structure components in fiber metal laminates. This paper presents the results of ongoing experimental and numerical research at the LUF into the forming of hybrid fiber metal laminates. The paper focuses on the dimensional accuracy of deep drawn FML-parts and the individual measures (tool, process and material design) necessary for achieving the desired part quality.