REDUCED WEIGHT AUTOMOTIVE BRAKE PEDAL TEST & ANALYSIS

Abstract

Currently, automotive industry continues to strive forlight weight vehicle for improving fuel efficiency and emission reduction. Itis crucial to design vehicles with an optimum weight for a better performanceof the car. In this field, which hasboundaries with fixed standards and regulations, manufacturers continue to workon characteristics, structures and types of the material to develop new components, which have same safetyspecifications but cheaper and lighter than current products.In this study, the strength analysis of a new design ofan automotive brake pedal is presented. In order to reduce the weight, analternative design, plasma welded two parts is studied instead of a monoblock gas arcwelded brake pedal arm. The estimation of the design life of both current andthe new pedal, a linear static stress analysis was performed via finite elementmethod. Here, critical regions where the stress concentration occurs weredetermined. Stress-life method was used to estimate the fatigue life of the brakepedal. Based on the analysis results, design enhancement solutions were appliedto extend the life of the new brake pedal. The computational analysis of thefatigue life of the pedal is validated utilizing a custom made test setup.