PRODUCTION OF A COMPOSITE MONOCOQUE FRAME FOR MOTORSPORTS APPLICATIONS (DESIGN AND TESTING)

摘要

A carbon fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP) monocoque racecar frame was designed andconstructed by students for a collegiate design series competition. This paper details the designand testing of various coupons to support the frame fabrication. A follow-on paper will coverthe actual fabrication and testing of the final frame.The design followed rules requiring that the monocoque frame have strength equal to or greaterthan the traditional steel space frames that they replace. There are also specific values forperimeter shear strength, main roll hoop attachment strength and driver harness attachment(pullout) strength. A variety of tests were devised to empirically determine required laminatethicknesses and layup orientations owing to the difficulty of modeling most of these phenomena.These included perimeter shear tests, pin shear tests, three point bend tests and tensile tests.Based on the results of these tests, a sandwich construction and a carbon/epoxy prepreg laminatedesign was selected. Starting from the outside, the sandwich structure consisted of a bidirectionalweave, three unidirectional layers, bi-directional weave, 16 mm aluminumhoneycomb core, bi-directional weave, two unidirectional layers and a final layer of bidirectionalweave (F/0_3/F/core/F/0_2/F). Additional layers were used in side impact regions andfor various hard point attachments.