Search Results

Global automotive companies have heavily invested in the vehicle development in order to provide higher energy efficiency performance to meet the new regulations, and to obtain tax incentives offered by the INOVAR AUTO PROGRAM. One way to improve the vehicle energy efficiency is reducing it mass or apply an optimization. The Body in White (BIW) optimization can be achieved applying aluminum parts, considering the aluminum is a lighter material than the steel, and the BIW is responsible for a significant percentage of the total mass of a vehicle. The Brazilian market to apply the aluminum in the car will face a great challenge, regarding the high vehicle production using aluminum parts. The main challenges are raw materials suppliers to meet the potential demand, the connections between aluminum parts and metal parts, material cost, manufacturing cost, reparability, skilled specialists, etc.

INOVAR-Auto program is a Brazilian government program to encourage innovation and improvement of the productive chain that aims stimulating investments in domestic auto industry providing tax benefits. However, to qualify for the incentive applicants the OEM's must meet several requirements and attend some vehicle performance targets. The body in white is an item that's directly linked to performance in terms of energy efficiency, so it's necessary lighter and stiffer bodies development comparing with the current ones. There is a lot of manufacturing process which may be applied in BIW construction, however some are more competitive considering present Brazilian automotive scenario. Considering this point, this paper will address two important forming processes that will be crucial to mass reduction and stiffness improvement in BIW: hydroforming and hot stamping. These process has a substantial utilization in USA and Europe, although are poorly used and exploited in Brazil.