| Scope |
This symposium will consider shaping and forming challenges that have arisen out of changes in vehicle design due to electrification. As the automotive industry continues to evolve, developments in manufacturing processes must keep pace to meet governmental mandates. Previous developments focused primarily on replacing heritage manufacturing processes with newer approaches that reduced costs, increased production volume, or incorporated new materials for improved light-weighting. Throughout these developments, the overall design and fabrication of components integrated into the body-in-white remained largely in place. As e-vehicles become increasingly mandated, however, automotive manufactures are responding with significant changes to the vehicle design in order to integrate the batteries and battery trays while also addressing their associated safety, weight, and cooling concerns. With the tray becoming an integral part of the load carrying capacity like in the case of structural battery pack, new shaping and forming processes are required to handle the new designs, materials, and constraints. One example is the skateboard chassis configuration, which requires alternative materials and manufacturing processes but allows automakers to design several vehicle categories around the same framework, thus reducing time and cost. Topics welcome within this symposium include shaping, forming or solid-state joining processes that will propel the fabrication of e-vehicles from low production to high production in upcoming years, notably those related to the production of the battery tray or structural elements. |