Design of the rear suspension is based around two springs and dampers. Bellcanks translate the motion of the A-arms into the springs. The fore mentioned parts are detailed in the image below.
The first iteration focused on the geometry as the primary purpose is to support the spring and bellcrank. As the design choice was made to construct the part from 3mm steel plate, the assembly was deemed too heavy.
Inspire was used to optimise the structure, based on pre-defined loads from the bellcranks and springs.
The structure was also analysed using Finite Element Analysis (FEA - Solidworks)
It was found that the original iteration could be optimised as no point of the structure exceed the materials yield point.
Altair Inspire was used to optimise the geometric shape,
The opimised output fom inspire was then translated into a new bellcrank and spring mount side plate, this resulted in a >1Kg weight reduction in the overall assembled structure.
Laser Cutting of cardboard was used to physically evaluate to model before making it out of steel. A good thing we did this process as we made some minor adjustments that made fitment easier.
The Final assembly was cut from 3mm steel plate, using a plasma CNC cutter (courtesy of VU-Foundation Studies).
Final Comments: The process of design though to development has been a fruitful process. For future iterations of this design more time can be spent of optimisation to reduce weight. In whole this was a fruitful learning experience.
