What changes have aluminum profiles brought to the lightweight development of automobiles?

The car adopts aluminum alloy profiles uses high-strength lightweight materials to achieve lightweight effects.

The so-called all aluminum body does mean that the entire body is made of pure aluminum, but rather that the main structural parts are made of aluminum profiles, other parts can be made of non aluminum materials. There are many types of aluminum profiles, ranging 1 series to 7 series. The profiles used for all aluminum bodies are mainly 5 series aluminum magnesium alloys 6 series aluminum magnesium alloys, as well as 2 series aluminum copper alloys for body metal sheets.

The use of aluminum profiles to achieve lightweight automotive effects has the following characteristics:

1. Lightweight

Aluminum alloys are lightweight due to their low density, only one-third of steel. Generally speaking, the body weight of a car is about 35% of the total weight of the vehicle. High strength steel is lighter than ordinary steel, aluminum profiles are lighter than high-strength steel. Usually, a car can use 500 kilograms of aluminum alloy material, which can reduce the overall weight by at least 40%, equivalent to a weight reduction of 200 kilograms for four adults on the car. The effect of a lightweight car is obvious.

2. High strength

Compared to steel, aluminum has a lower density. Assuming 2mm thick steel 4mm thick aluminum are used to achieve the same strength; But the weight of steel is half that of aluminum, which means that using half the weight of aluminum can achieve the same strength as steel. So generally, the aluminum plate of an all aluminum body is 0.2-0.5mm thicker than steel. By utilizing the low density advantage of aluminum material, the high strength of the body is achieved by increasing the thickness of the material, in order to improve the safety performance of the car.

3. Strong corrosiveness

Aluminum is a lively metal that is prone to oxidation in the air. After oxidation, aluminum alloy water oxygen in the air form a dense aluminum oxide film on the surface of the material. It can closely bond with the aluminum substrate to form a very stable protective layer. Through subsequent anodic oxidation, electrophoretic coating, powder coating, this protective film can also be thick has good corrosion resistance, can adapt to various adverse industrial environments, It can extend the service life of the vehicle.

4. Good plasticity

The body aluminum profiles mainly use 5 series 6 series aluminum alloys, with high strength, tensile strength of up to 180 MPa, yield strength of over 127 MPa, strong plasticity; The tensile strength of carbon steel is 235 MPa, the yield strength is 207 MPa. Compared to this, aluminum profiles have better plasticity. By relying on modern high-tech stamping sheet metal technology, it can produce very complex entire aluminum bodies, such as two typical models of Jaguar Audi. This beautiful curve cannot be made with steel.

5. The price is expensive

Although all aluminum body has the above advantages, it cannot be promoted at present. The most important point is high costs, including raw material costs production process costs. Ordinary models can't bear the full aluminum body because of its high cost. Even luxury cars like the new generation Audi A8 can't afford to be hurt. Considering the cost, in some places, high-strength steel can only be used to replace the full aluminum parts.

The production cost of aluminum alloy is high, the cost is complex. The reason why the aluminum oxide is insoluble in the welding part is that it is easy to form cracks, it is completed by high laser welding cold metal welding technology; Non welded parts are connected by rivets adhesives, rivets usually use self piercing rivets self tapping screws. The production process requirements are very complex strict. Before using the adhesive, it is also necessary to treat the oxide layer on the surface of the aluminum profile, which has high requirements for the production environment requires manual operation. By adding up the production costs in all aspects, the cost of the entire vehicle becomes very high.

Applying a series of advantages such as light weight, strong corrosion resistance, strong plasticity of aluminum profiles to all aluminum body, making the vehicle have excellent safety performance maneuverability, to achieve energy-saving emission reduction in automotive lightweight effects, still has a very broad market prospect. In the later stage, by increasing driving range, optimizing battery configuration, reducing production costs, expanding the development of lightweight vehicles, all of these are inseparable the application of aluminum profiles. In the future, by transforming the entire aluminum profile luxury cars to low-end vehicles, ordinary people can also have it.