The Development of Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer Upright Prototypes for a Formula SAE Race Vehicle

Abstract

The upright functions as a bearing housing and connects all outboard linkages from the chassis to the wheel and tire, making their design critical to vehicle performance. To this end, this project focused on the development of four unique carbon fiber reinforced polymer uprights with all critical features molded after the initial cure with minimal post-processing from a common tool set. The composite uprights were developed through material failure strength evaluation, application of finite element analysis, and verified through on-vehicle static structural testing for use on the University of Kansas Formula SAE vehicle.Through the composite laminate development, components were designed with a Hashin factor of safety of 1.650 for the front upright and 1.582 for the rear upright. Moreover, utilizing a composite material resulted in a decrease in mass compared to aluminum of 55.0% and 20.0% for the front and rear uprights, respectively, while allowing for a component camber change contribution of 0.015 degree/g and 0.153 degree/g at the tire. Static structural testing utilizing strain gages suggested an average error of 5.4% for the front uprights and 4.8% for the rear uprights in comparison to the finite element models. As a result, the performance of a Formula SAE vehicle is improved through the development of carbon fiber reinforced polymer uprights.