Double wishbone suspension in F1 assignment PLEASE HELP

[1234567]

Hi,

I am currently studying mechanical engineering and for our recent assignment, we have to choose two materials suitable for use when designing and F1 wishbone. We need to look at the suitability for purpose of each material, comparing statistics of both.

Firstly i have chosen CFRP as i have done alot of research and its the most i could find, i have already discussed the benefits of strength/weight ratio and how weight reduction is crucial so weight can be distributed to other key areas. however im struggling to come up with another material

any help would be greatly appreciated as alot of the information i have gathered has been from reading a variety of posts on this website, i just need some specifics.

Thanks

[xxChrisxx]

I'd suggest you are approaching this from the wrong direction. You dont start with no materials then pick one because it's a go to exotic material then struggle to pick another.

You start with every material in the universe then apply filters to get to the final selection (hyperbole, but you get the idea). So to start you need to know what you want to achieve.

What is a wishbone designed to do?
What physical properties would you want from a material to do this job?

[bill shoe]

I second xxChrisxx's reply, but if you want an answer to the question as written, then:

I nominate high-strength steel. It has the flexibility and strength to allow the flexural joints for smooth movement with almost no stiction, combined with the high strength and stiffness to allow thin cross-sections for good aero. Relative low cost then allows scarce money to be applied to other areas of the car...

[ChrisDanger]

Something to consider with regards to aero is that the drag coefficient of a wing section is somewhere about a tenth of that for a rod having the same thickness. Which is a good reason to mold a CFRP element rather than using a simple metal rod, other than the material's mechanical properties.

[Tommy Cookers]

..... the drag coefficient of a wing section is somewhere about a tenth of that for a rod having the same thickness

this is only true at one ideal direction of airflow
eg a streamline section wishbone at about 12 deg or more off angle will give more drag than a round section wishbone
(anyway, it is quite easy to make metal in elliptical or streamline section)

iirc F1 rules limit wishbone's ability to modify or condition airflow by limiting their chord and shape
this aspect strongly favours CFRP and is presumably worth the price in drag of operation away from the minimum drag coefficient

CFRP having outstanding mass-specific stiffness, aerodynamically-thin streamlined sections will still have good buckling resistance

in F1 wishbones conventional mechanical strength is surely not the dominant design factor ?

[Greg Locock]

Tommy's last sentence identifies where the cart has been put before the horse. The first thing to do with a material selection process is to define your design inputs, and then if you are lucky you can come up with simple (if contradictory) measures such as E/rho, cost/E, and so on.

[Cold Fussion]

As everyone else has said before, the engineering way to approach this problem is to first define your strength, stiffness, mass and geometric requirements and from there you would attempt to pick a material that is able to satisfy those requirements. From there you could filter them by cost, ease of manufacture etc.

[Powerslide]

a transparent graphene set up should be very interesting

[JuanJo]

About the materials, you need to have a discard approach, a very good software doing this is the CES Edupack, good luck!