Fender Design - Wheel Arch Challenge

FENDER REPORT - WHEEL ARCH REPORT

Objective :

To calculate the wheel arc area and prove whether the car will pass the European standards or not.

Theory :

Fender -

The word fender is actually a shortening of the word 'defender', an attachment added to boats, fireplaces and eventually to cars to protect their parts from damage.

Nowadays, all OEMs mainly aiming at the reducing the dead weight of the car, thereby reducing overall production cost.

The fender is an aesthetic surface which is located over front and rear wheels, which protects the components inside the engine compartment from chipping caused by the tires.

The design of the fender is determined in terms of wheel arch area and drip area. Now, we are going to calculate the wheel arch area of given fender and check whether it meets the European standards or not.

European regulations of Fender design :

• Measure the clearance L at sections SA-SA, SB-SB, SC-SC, SD-SD and SE-SE and produce the clearance check chart to validate.
• At all five sections, the clearance L value should be greater than 10 mm to satisfy the European regulations.
• Wheel guard requirement - The value of 'a' shall be more than 5 mm at a line 30 degrees forward and 50 degrees rearward from the central vertical axis of axis of wheel.

Procedure :

• Create the plane at the outermost edge of the wheel
• Create the sketch on that plane. Take the reference from the outer edge of the wheel and inner edge of the fender.
• Create the axis lines from the center of the wheel at 0, 90 and 180 degrees.
• Consider vertical 90 degrees line as SA. Draw a line 30 degrees forward line SB and 50 degrees backward line SC from SA.
• Now create the offset line at a distance of 150 mm from the horizontal line of the wheel center and make an intersection point with fender reference. Draw a line from the center of the wheel to this point and name it as SE.
• Now create the exact center point between the SC and SE on fender reference. Draw a line from the wheel center to this point and name this as SD.
• Now measure the clearance L between these lines and the fender outer edge in the direction parallel to the axis of the wheel. Create the checklist.
• Also, measure the value of 'a' from SB and SC sections to the edge of the fender in the direction perpendicular to the axis of the wheel. Create the checklist.

Creating plane

Sketch of reference sections SA, SB, SC, SD and SE.

Measure the clearance 'L'

Section SB

Section SA

Section SC

Section SD

Section SE

Results table :

From the results obtained, it is justified that the given fender, does not meet the European standards because it was required to maintain the minimum clearance of 10 mm at the sections SA, SB, SC, SD and SE. The given model failed in the four cases.

Measure the distance 'a'

Section SB

Section SC

Results table :

As per European standards, the required distance between the wheel edge and fender edge in a direction perpendicular to the wheel axis should be a minimum of 5 mm. Here, at the both sections, the value is greater than 5 mm. So, European standards for clearance 'a' are satisfied.

Wheel arch length

Wheel arch area

Conclusion :

From the obtained results, it has concluded that, the given fender model does not meet the European standards.

The suggestion given to the styling team is to improve the curvature to the outer side of the fender in the sections SB, SC, SD and SE up to 10 mm or more.