Design And Analysis Of A Lightweight Chassis For Human Powered Vehicle

Zainol, Sabri Adlan (2017) Design And Analysis Of A Lightweight Chassis For Human Powered Vehicle. Project Report. UTeM, Melaka, Malaysia. (Submitted)

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Abstract

Human powered vehicle (HPV) is a transportation powered by muscular strength. A typical HPV weighted between 30 kg to 50 kg, which is quite heavy for racing and recreation. Thus, most of the HPV have difficulties and require more efforts to move. This is because the chassis of the HPV is too heavy. Therefore, this thesis aims to design a lightweight chassis with ideal stiffness through acceleration and cornering analysis. The selection of the design and material for the chassis are crucial to make sure that the HPV is strong, lightweight and rigid. There are four designs with different size of structural beam that will be analysed using Finite Element Analysis (FEA) in ANSYS Workbench. Furthermore, three different materials are applied to each design in the analysis. The analysis cover acceleration, cornering and torsional analysis in a static condition. Next, the analysis is conducted by applying loads and fix supports to some parts of the chassis. The loads represent the weight of the driver; will be applied at the centre of the chassis where the driver would be seated. Whereas, the fix supports are applied at all points which have tyres. From the analysis, ANSYS Workbench will produce total deformation, mass, Von-mises stress and safety factor results. Later, some calculations are performed to obtain ideal bending and torsional stiffness. After that, the design with desirable mass will be tested with safety factor to make sure it is within a suitable range. Meanwhile, the Von-mises stress will be compared with yield stress of each material to identify the toughness of the chassis. Then, the results will be compared with benchmarks from another sources to achieve the objectives of this study. Finally, the best chassis design that provide low weight, better stiffness and ideal safety factor is selected through weight decision matrix analysis.

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