The Royal Institution for the Advancement of Learning/McGill University

Published purpose

The automotive industry currently faces a significant number of economic and environmental challenges related to fuel efficiency and electrification of transportation. As a result, there has been in recent years a sharp increase in demand for lighter components in response to the need to save weight to reduce GHG emissions coming from conventional combustion engine vehicles and to increase driving range of electric vehicles. So far, lightweighting efforts have focused on a wide range of materials including metals and advanced composite materials. However, despite the significant progress accomplished, the industry is still looking for more cost-effective solutions for the massproduction of lightweight components. One of the most-promising alternatives for the fabrication of cost-effective lightweight components consists in metalcomposite hybrids. Hybrid components made of steel and advanced composites combine high mechanical performance with low weight. This Project thus focuses on the development of hybrid components manufactured using a one-step process. In particular, this Project aims at modeling the forming process of metal/composites hybrids to allow metal deformation and fibre orientations to be predicted in order to provide the necessary information required for the design of components and production tools.