Lightweight design and resource conservation potentials for die cast components

Kurzfassung

Lightweight cast structures are an important component in the design of vehicle bodies, chassis parts and powertrain components. New components for electromobility and their changed requirements as well as the trend towards larger structural components of vehicles create new opportunities in the die casting of aluminum and magnesium alloys. The complexity and functional integration that can be achieved with die-cast components offer the possibility to realize a load-balanced design where material is only used where it is needed. In general, this results in lighter components compared to other production methods leading to a reduction of CO2-emissions during vehicle operation. An advanced method to design casted parts is shown based on a gearbox cover of an electric drive unit that is investigated in the project “InDrutec-E” funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. Combining this method with the usage of high strength aluminum alloys with high recycling content and no need for subsequent heat treatment leads to a further increase of the lightweight design potential as well as a reduction of costs and hence also a reduction of CO2-emissions starting from the production phase. Prospectively, further cost reduction, scarce raw materials and supply chain issues will also play an increasingly important role in the competitiveness of a production method. The findings shown give an overview on a possible way to tackle these issues for die casting. In this lecture the method used to design and optimize a casted component is shown. In the use case presented, all modifications in total lead to a weight reduction of more than 30 % in an aluminum variant compared with the conventionally designed aluminum reference. By further replacing aluminum with magnesium, even 50 % weight reduction could be achieved.