HBK Measurement Technology Optimises a Vehicle's Wishbone

The idea is to manufacture the wishbones entirely from carbon fibre-reinforced plastic. Therefore, simulations were carried out to analyse the effects on the wishbone, which now have to be validated with physical tensile and compression tests. 

The Idea: A Wishbone Made of Carbon Fibre-Reinforced Plastics

To reduce the weight of the vehicle, the undamped masses located between the tires and the spring/damper package must be reduced first and foremost. This also includes the wishbones, which connect the steering knuckle to the chassis. To reduce their weight the wishbones were entirely manufactured from carbon fibre-reinforced plastic. Thanks to the new wishbones, the following benefits can be achieved:

• Lower weight
• Control through in-house production
• Higher stability

In order to exploit the benefits, the action on the wishbones must be analysed in detail, for which simulations are carried out in advance. To verify these simulations, tests must be carried out with bonded strain gauges to determine how the actual forces correspond to the results of the simulation.

High Speed Karlsruhe, Vehicle F-117

HBK strain gauges are bonded to the surface to determine how the actual forces correspond to the results of the simulation. Moreover, the results provide a basis for further vehicle tests and the design of future wishbones.

Preparation of the Measurement: Simple Installation of Strain Gauges with the HBK Starter Kit

For tensile testing on a test rig, the control arms of the vehicle must be prepared. To optimally record the forces, strain gauges must be installed in the direction of force application along the wishbones. This is done by using the HBK Starter-Kit, which contains all the necessary materials for the installation.

To install the strain gauges correctly, the surface must first be cleaned with a chemically pure cleaning agent (e.g. RMS1), which is included in the starter kit. Cleaning is easy using the enclosed non-woven pads. Subsequently, the surface is roughened in several passes with sandpaper and cleaned again with the enclosed RMS1. The strain gauge is installed on the wishbone using the fast-curing Z70 adhesive and the integrated fluoropolymer release film. 

Measurement Setup and Execution of the Measurement

The tensile and compression tests are carried out in the laboratories of the Karlsruhe University of Applied Sciences to test the material connection of the strain gauges to the carbon fibre-reinforced plastic tube and to evaluate whether future tests would work on the moving vehicle. 

For this purpose, the control arms are clamped in the testing machine. This is done using a specially designed and manufactured clamping device, which optimally fixes the control arm. 

The voltage output of the HBK analogue amplifiers is measured with a multimeter and then compared with the results of the tensile testing machine. 

Since only one of the two struts is used for the measurement at a time, the second strain gauge is used for thermal compensation with a quarter-bridge circuit. For this purpose, the settings of the values for the strain gauges, which can be found on the enclosed data sheets, are entered into the measuring amplifier and adjusted with an integrated rotary potentiometer.

The Measurement Results and Their Interpretation

The measurement was carried out according to the principle of linearization to enable different forces to be applied by the testing machine and the stresses to be read off at these points. This makes it possible to determine whether the strain gauges show an identical force curve as, in this case, the tractor.