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Technical Paper

Cost-Effectiveness of a Lightweight BIW Design for 2020-2025: An Assessment of a Midsize Crossover Utility Vehicle Body Structure

2013-04-08
2013-01-0667
This paper describes the methodology and analyses used to engineer and evaluate a 37% mass-reduced body structure relative to a baseline, steel body-in-white (BIW). This paper is based on two published Lotus studies including “An Assessment of Mass Reduction Opportunities for a 2017-2020 Model Year Vehicle Program” (2010 - Phase 1) and “Evaluating the Structure and Crashworthiness of a 2020 Model-Year, Mass-Reduced Crossover Vehicle Using FEA Modeling” (2012 - Phase 2). The links to these papers are included in the References section on page 12. The results of the 2010 paper, which projects a potential vehicle curb weight reduction of over 30% and a 38% reduction for non-powertrain systems, are summarized. An example demonstrating the total vehicle holistic approach is included. A summary of the methodology, which included a high level of component integration, parts reduction/elimination, reduced scrap and lower cost tooling, is discussed.
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