Engineering and Design

For my graduation thesis, I chose a subject which would involve work with the design of suspensions. I found that at my university with HAN Automotive Research. The project was done with a Dynteq. My project with them involved the design of a rear suspension for an electric cargo bike. This project is protected by confidentiality, therefore not all the details and images can be shared on this post. However, I would like to share my experience of designing a suspension. Cargo bikes are becoming quite popular in Europe as the streets of old cities are very small and narrow, having cargo bikes allows delivery companies to use them for use within city deliveries, as they don’t take up much space on the roads and in some countries and cities they can also make use of cycle lanes, thus reducing the van traffic congestion. Having electric bikes also allows for less pollution within the city. A typical delivery van consuming space on both the road and pavement in a narrow street ...

The minor I chose in my study was the lightweight vehicle design minor, I chose this minor because of my inclination towards motorsports. Within motorsports, it is very important for the vehicle to be lightweight to perform well in competitions. The weight of the vehicle affects almost every aspect of the vehicle, the handling, the braking performance, acceleration as well as the fuel consumption. As a chassis engineer, I believe it is important to know how to design lightweight parts. During my study the subjects included lightweight constructions, composite material science, mechanics of materials and finite element analysis. We were introduced to several techniques to achieve lightweight structures. This included using topology optimisation using finite element analysis, using sandwich panels, composites as well as lightweight materials like aluminium, titanium and magnesium. Solidworks static simulation, torsion test In this minor I, along with fellow students also ...