Design and Numerical Analysis of a Roof-Mounted Bicycle Carrier

摘要

The purpose of this paper is to present the design process and subsequent numerical analysis calculations of a new roof-mounted bicycle carrier for vehicles. The bicycle carrier is mounted on the vehicles longitudinal bars. The designed construction is subjected to both static and dynamic load sets to check if it meets the requirements of ISO 11154 norm - which specifies the minimum safety requests for roof load carrier intended for mounting on the roof of passengers cars and light commercial vehicles with a maximum authorized total mass up to 3,5t. To fulfil the specifications associated to safety, standards and traffic laws test four different software packages were used: CATIA V5 and NACA airfoil generator for designing, Cambridge Engineering Selector for choosing the most suitable materials and Abaqus CAE for Finite Element Analysis.