Fender Design Challenge
Fender Design
Objective: To design a front fender for a vehicle with Design considerations
Fender is the American English term for the part of an automobile, motorcycle, or other vehicle body that frames a wheel well. Its primary purpose is to prevent, sand, mud, rocks, liquids, and other roads spray from being thrown into the air by the rotating tire. Fenders are typically rigid and can be damaged by contact with the road surface.
Sticky materials, such as mud, may adhere to the smooth outer tire surface, while smooth loose objects, such as stones, can become temporarily embedded in the tread grooves as the tire rolls over the ground. These materials can be ejected from the surface of the tire at high velocity as the tire impacts kinetic energy to the attached objects. For a vehicle moving forward, the top of the tire is rotating upward and forward and can throw objects into the air at other vehicles or pedestrians in front of the vehicle.
Two Types of fenders
The current market trend follows the half bumper style, cause in its reduction in weight, giving better performance for the vehicle, and thereby reducing the cost to produce.
Mounting point for the fenders
5 common mounting points in a fender
Body
A-pillar
Sill
Cowl
Drip
Study of the drip area with design requirements
As the picture showed above, this shows that these are the necessary design dimension to keep in mind, while preparing to design the drip area. The dimension 150mm has to be fixed, can’t be below the required value and 200mm must be 300mm or less to pass the clearance since the headlight mounting bracket comes in place as well as the cowl zone would be installed along with the motors.
Master Section of the fender
Design Considerations:
Here, the Drip flange for the mounting region must have a 35 or 40mm clearance value. And must have a value 10 mm or more from the engine room.
When the drip surface is stamped, 3 deg must be secured for spring back. The angle can be increased to make the necessary modifications.
The hood side drip depth length must be 40mm or less as it reaches its maximum productivity. Forming is not feasible if depth exceeds 60mm due to spring back. Thus, making the part less stable. To make the drip area have less spring back movement the value should lay between 40 to 60mm.
The reason there is a fillet radius of 2.5mm, cause it's adding strength and stability to the material and to avoid unnecessary vibrations in the part.
This 47.5 mm is the distance from the hood endpoint to the fender. If this value cannot be met, the part will not be produced. This is for pedestrian safety requirements.
A min of 5mm of flatness is given to all the mounting holes on the fender. Except for the baffle mounting area.
Baffle Mounting region
The region which is marked in yellow is the point where the baffle gets installed to the fender with the help of a few clips which hold the baffle in place.
Bumper Mounting area
An emboss is given to the bumper region, as it will be clamped on with bolts, giving it extra stability and strength to the material. Giving it a fillet radius of 3mm to the edges and having a 5 mm flatness on the holes located on the emboss region.
Drip Area
As the drip area was designed according to the design requirements, embosses were given making the mounting platform along with the 5 mm flatness provided on the holes located on the embossed region and giving a dart on the edge of the drip zone, giving it more stability and adding strength to the material.
A-Pillar Mounting zone
An emboss is given to the a-pillar mounting region, as it will be clamped on with bolts, giving it extra stability and strength to the material. Giving it a fillet radius of 3mm to the edges and having a 5 mm flatness on the holes located on the emboss region.
Sill Mounting region
An emboss is given to the sill mounting region, as it will be clamped on with fasteners, giving it extra stability and strength to the material. Giving it a fillet radius of 3mm to the edges and having a 5 mm flatness on the holes located on the emboss region. And finally, the whole fender was thickened with 0.75mm.
Views
Conclusion:
The fender was completed having all the design considerations and the fender was successful.
Link to the Fender File part
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KEFybR4pUkUC5O4-LPm3AY_2sD3Ileaz/view?usp=sharing