Study on the design method of equal strength rim based on stress and fatigue analysis using finite element method

Wheels are important safety components in the vehicle driving system. Automobile lightweight is the direction of the modern automobile development. In this article, steel wheel lightweight was studied. The equal strength design of rim was used to reduce the weight of the wheel. Stress analysis of the wheel was studied using UG/Nastran. A professional software WheelStrength was used to predict the radial and cornering fatigue lives of the wheel. Sheet stamping process was set up to analyze the interference fit between the disk and the rim. The assembly was simulated by axisymmetric finite element method. After calculation and analysis, the stress distributions and fatigue lives for rim under different load cases have been found. The thicknesses of wheel rim bead and the interface between rim and disk cannot be reduced. Stress and fatigue simulation results were compared using different thicknesses of the optimized region. It was found that the best thickness of the optimized region was 1.5 mm. Spinning was used to form the flared preform. The thickness of the rim after spinning and rolling forming agreed well with the simulation. The results of fatigue tests indicated that the lightweight wheel met the design requirement. The weight of the rim was reduced by about 14%.