Success in developing the new generation of cars and trucks has demanded advancements in many arenas, including powertrains, fuels, materials, manufacturing methods and design. Computer-aided engineering tools from Altair have advanced as well allowing design engineers to improve vehicle efficiency and performance while at the same time lightening the vehicle structure. Altair’s Vice President of Global Automotive, Dave Mason offers answers to some of the most important questions about Altair’s role in the use of composites for today’s vehicles.

My colleague, Giuseppe Resta, Manager, Global Automotive at Altair Engineering submitted the following blog post.

It doesn’t seem so long ago that passenger safety and vehicle crashworthiness were the battleground where automakers differentiated their products. Now, as many OEMs have created product development systems that rely on a CAE-driven strategy to deliver excellent passive safety performance, it appears to have taken a backseat to miles-per-gallon. Almost every car commercial touts greater fuel efficiency and seeks to validate the manufacturer’s environmental credentials.

This post is taken from Simulate to Innovate

I was chatting recently with fellow Altair blogger Bob Yancey about the use of the word ‘composites’. Yancey will often write about the application of high-end laminate constructions for aerospace applications. While this is a similar type of composite to those used by our racecar customers, such as Dallara, most automotive composites are perhaps better described as ‘engineered plastics’. The engineered part of that name is important, as not all plastics are composites; that soda bottle you drank from earlier was just plastic.