A group of Japanese companies which control 70% of the global carbon fiber market want to increase the usage of carbon fiber in automobiles. Carbon fiber can deliver the same strength as steel at just one fifth an equivalent amount of steel’s weight, but carbon fiber applications in automobiles currently account only for less than 1 percent of the carbon fiber production.
Traditionally carbon fiber has been reserved for more expensive cars such as the BMW M3 with its carbon fiber roof, and the NIssan GT-R with its carbon fiber engine underguard and radiator panel. But it may soon trickle down to more mass-production cars – Toyota displayed the Toyota 1/X Concept car at the 2007 Tokyo Motor Show last year. It uses a carbon fiber reinforced plastic body frame, has the same interior size as a Toyota Prius, but only weighs one third the weight.
Carbon fiber is expensive because of cost of materials, cost of manufacturing and time needed for manufacturing. It requires lots of energy to heat and treat the fibers, and molding the material takes hours. There is also a relatively high level of wastage. One of the companies – Teijin – intends to speed up the production process via a 10 minute molding process, but this looks like an eternity compared to sheet metal stamping which needs roughly only a second.
With rising gas prices, cutting down vehicle weight is one way to improve fuel economy. Together with gradually improved carbon fiber molding processes, may see more application of carbon fiber in cars.
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the problem is, cars today are generally bigger than the model they replace. I just wonder when this “up-sizing” will end. weight has also increased thanks to the desire for more sound proofing, gadgets ..etc.
Thats one way of tacking the current trend of vehicular obesity.
A heavy vehicle is hard on suspension, brakes, tyres, and you need a bigger motor that kills your fuel economy, which in turn, worst of all adds MORE weight.
Too bad its still very expensive.
I had a buddy of mine that rebodied almost his whole car in carbon fiber (only the rear quater panel was steel), shaved 200kgs off the car….being a carbon fiber manufacturer for custom race bike fairings, he has the expertise and tools to do it himself.
So 4G63T DSM, where’s your friend’s workshop? Maybe I’ll want him to do things like this too. About the topic, as I always said to my father when choosing a car, bigger doesn’t always means better. At last, he learn that lesson after bought a Naza Ria, and sell it before causing too much trouble.
Well we can always get the carbon fiber stickers at brothers instead. :D
Carbon fibre will never amount to a real alternative to steel. It is tool labour intensive and expensive. Lets face it the golden age of motoring is over. The concept of personal transport need to change in order to cope with fuel cost, material cost and global warming.
carbon fibre is still very expensive…and maybe it will cost u more when u get cought by JPJ`s …ticket for black painted hood..dunno if carbon fibre hood illigel oso..anyone know?
what if the car with CF part involved with accident?
Cannot send to magad shop to ketuk-ketuk the dent out from CF.
So, is the car owner going to replace the whole CF panel? gonna cost a bomb.
CF is just exclusive to sportscar/supercar/big boss car. Not for average joe.
fighter_b2500, i heard cf hood is illegal. Make it simple, everything ‘wierd’ to them is illegal. our jpj officer sumhow is very outdated in car technology.
In fact, the so called “carbon fibre” stickers are not cheap at Brothers…. hehe! Don’t be fool by any Proton cars, especially Proton Wira comes with OEM carbon fibre dashboard…..of cause they are mimic stuff. Anyway, it looks great and reflect sportiness of the car. If it is the real thing, wow…. damn expensive!
LHQ,
My friends shop is in canada. So, sorry. But if you are really interested in his work, www.squidskins.com. His car is an Eagle Talon TurboAWD
I hope Paul doesn;t mind hotlinking.
I had my racing buckets custom made by him. Was the most comfortable seats i’ve ever owned.
if cars using standard tyre for spare tyre,
go to chop shop, buy a slim temporay tyre as a spare tyre could save weight,
cheaper to begin with.
so in the future, a Gallardo or F430 with extended carbon fibre parts will no longer be so “special”, hahaha~
4g63t, carbon fibre is a great idea, but as you yourself said, the whole idea of motorised transport has to change.
an example is the new M3, its got carbon reinforced plastic roof, almost all alloy suspension, engine is 15kg than the straight six it replaced.. yet the car still weighs in more than the e46 m3. imagine the weight without any weight saving materials..
Hmmm… this thread remind me of the ‘Automotive X Prize’ contest… and the Tesla Roadster :)
Carbon fibre may not be feasible as replacement for current automotive materials. As stated, the production cost is higher relative to the conventional materials. Don’t forget that the process of producing the carbon fibre also consumes energy. Some may not find it feasible to waste a huge amount of energy to make carbon fibre just to save daily petrol.
Maybe econ of scale will reduce CF cost??..maybe….if cars start normal/mass production using CF…but drawback, no kedai ketuk repair anymore!!
anyway, nowadays top shelve racing/road bicycle & mountain bike are using CF…great stuff coz very light weight & tough for cycling weight weenies….anyway, for me self still planning to get a full suspension All Mountain Bike wt normal alloys so can tackle kiara wt confident instead falling around using my hardtail….will consider CF if goin racing
How do you repair a broken carbon fiber from an accident? Need to replace the whole stuff right. Cannot use welding torch on it or tampal like steel can.
Carbon Fiber was a good idea! just that the only draw back is the shape is not changeable or to be reshape….
But i can tel u that when there’s a impact, carbon fiber material will help protects the occupants better than metal. However, using only carbon fiber as the main source will not be enough. If there’s a reinforce carbon fiber with composite material such as natural fiber, or particle, it will be a real high tensile material we are seeing.
Gotta agree with BanyakMasukWorkshop. Just look at the new Accord, it’s even bigger than 5-series!! Next what? The Honda Civic’s gonna be bigger than the Maybach 62 or RR Phantom? Next gen CR-V’s gonna be bigger than a Challenger II battle tank? It may be true what with all the car manufacturer’s obsession to make everything bigger.
I just don’t understand why the hell all car manufacturers go with “the bigger, the better”. Best case in point will be Mini Cooper. Ppl would say the original one is a nice small, light fun car. The new one drives very well too, but it’s different. It’s heavy and glutton-ed with all kinds of gadgets, and to me, no matter how good it drives, it’s just not that British small, fun car people once knew. It has become a German’s idea of a small, fun car.
Carbon fibre, hm……sounds good, but I still want to see a downsize in car’s size. It’s about time car manufacturers shud focus on how to make a car the size of Kancil, but with 5-star Euro NCAP and interior space comfortable for 6-footers and able to do 160km/h or more effortlessly. Plain and simple, screw all kinds of Ipod-integrator, Sat-nav which never works, cameras everywhere to help u park, 342113211312 Ah Beng speakers with THX, blablabla. The oni downsize that I’ve ever known is the Mazda 2. Now that’s a car that’s truely smaller, lighter and better than the previous version. Yet, its interior isn’t a hell for 6-footers. More cars shud be like it.
so is a Lotus Elise extremely fuel efficient?
NA 1.8 liter. weighs in less than 1 ton.
or the Ariel Atom?
Promising as it is, manufacturing the CF panels should be as easy as the metal counterpart to make it cheap. Otherwise won’t see CF application in common cars anytime soon.
the lotus is actually fuel efficient. its also very efficient with everything else. less tyre wear, less brake wear..etc.. but its so basic, many people cant live with it..
but its still expensive, because its generally hand-made, and the material construction is still one of a kind in the world, and extremely hi-tech
May 14, 2008 @ 11:15 pm
I just don’t understand why the hell all car manufacturers go with “the bigger, the betterâ€.
——-
Thats because customers themsleves are getting bigger. Not noticed have you? :p
Besides no one is stopping anyone from buying a smaller car. As the more mainstream units grow bigger, new smaller models will slot in.
Back then it was the Civic and Accord. Now we have the Fit/Jazz, City, Civic and Accord. Don’t need a big car, buy a small one….unless you are one of these brand/badge conscious people…… :p
Another alternative to this is the increased use of composite plastics for non load bearing panels (hoods, doors skins, fenders…etc). Look at the X-trails front fenders. CF is good and fine, but too expensive. Besides if it wasn;t for a load bearing structure you wont have to worry about strength that CF provides.
The realities are that customers are getting bigger, demanding more comfort (ie…more noise insulation, bigger seats) and appreciating higher luxury (leather, electric everything, automatic everything) and increased safety conciousess (air bags everywhere, crumple zones). All these add weight.
I’m sure if one could afford an Accord, they wont buy the tin can old Saga LMST. Nothing wrong with the saga, its light, fairly reliable (compared to the garbage they have been churning out) and good on fuel. Its simply not what people want anymore.
Cars are getting bigger and less efficient for now. Maybe in the future, they’ll make them bigger and increase the drivetrain efficiency. I believe that there are already some tweaks that the manufacturer can do to increase the efficiency while maintaining performance but not implemented due to financial un-feasibility or maybe it’s just their strategy to implement later to ensure their continuous profit.
Lighter weight would save us fuel, but i wonder how long it would take to recoup the ‘energy’ used to manufacture a carbon fibre component. It may not be as economically sound as it looks on paper.
i think all aluminium body will be good idea.. cut down more weight, and stronger too. Carbon fiber is too costly, even its on huge production, we dont get honda or toyota with carbon fiber body.
1. CF is not legal if its not produced by the manufacturer (OEM) itself. Because JPJ only legalized the car after the manufacturer has done considerable amount of tests to the car & sold as it is.
2. CF may be equivalent to steel in terms of strength however as a structural member of the system it will not react like the original designed part made of steel. A considerable amount of re-engineering & re-designing is need to achieve similar structural properties as the original.
3. CF parts cannot be repaired. Even a smallest hole/crack/dent will destroy the overall structural strength of the system. And forget about knocking out dents. In long run it may be more costly to run.
4. CF need to bonded using composite matrix, could be metal, ceramic or polymer. To get lightest weight, we use polymer. However, the downside is that most polymers have poor resistant to UV (sun), heat (engine & sun), chemical (rain) & also absorbs a %-age of water making it susceptible to premature damage.
5. CF manufacturing is labor extensive. Even the slightest mistake (air bubbles, poor resin-hardener mixture, poor curing temperature, pressure & time) will significantly affect the quality.
6. CF is very expensive. A medium size CF woven mat can cost few hundreds. Normally few layers of CF mats are used to produce parts. This is because a CF woven mat has bi-directional stress strength. A few layers is arranged in different angles will make it multi-directional. Each layer placed will go through resin laying process. You can imagine how long it takes & how expensive it will cost.
Summary: with all the cost going up. It is a not economical to go for CF. Unless you expect your car to run some 50 years. By then, you won't even dare being seen in a 50 years old car!!