On the design of a low-cost racing car chassis

Traditional chassis technologies still play an important role in the racing and sports car market. The design of such a specialist vehicle is a matter of finding a compromise between performance, safety and manufacturing costs. Performance mainly means a high torsional stiffness which directly affects the cornering behaviour of the vehicle. Safety issues regard the impact absorbing capability of the structure. On the cost side it should be underlined that racing cars are usually hand-made in very small numbers. The production of low power, low cost racing cars in particular is heavily affected by workmanship costs. The paper aims to present a project currently under development at the University of Brescia with the co-operation of Metra, one of the leading European companies in the field of aluminium alloy extrusion. A single-seater chassis has been designed with the main target of matching reduced manufacturing costs with high safety and structural performance levels. The chassis sidewalls are one-piece, closed section light alloy extrusions which provide bending and torsion stiffness as well as energy absorption properties for either front and side impacts. The two beams directly support the front suspension and engine. A casting and traditional steel tube rollbars connect the beams, together with a few honeycomb panels bonded into rails designed in the section. Purposely designed extrusions also replace traditional castings for components like wheel uprights and clutch bell allowing for relevant scale economy.