FME Transactions (Jan 2012)
Applied research for weight reduction of an industrial trailer
Abstract
The goal of this paper is to reduce the weight of a trailer with the aim to decrease both the transportation cost for goods and also reduce air pollution. The trailer is composed by many different components; each of them is studied and elaborated in order to achieve the target stated above. This operation may be done changing both the geometry and the materials used to produce the components. The main components are: the structural frame (composed by I-beams, transversal beams, brakets and rear bumper), the axels and the wheels; the materials used are a classical structural steel, a high strengh steel, an aluminium alloy and a composite material. The main rule used in this process is that the new component must have almost the same mechanical behaviour of the original (safety factor, stiffness, dynamical behaviour, etc.). Therefore, many different load conditions have been performed and some of these were aquired from the relevant standard. The final trailer shows that there are many choices to reduce the weight and in particular, if the trailer is made of aluminium alloy and composite material, the weight reduction is about 45 %, compared with the structural steel.
