JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #63 - March 2011 - 12

Concept of carbon monocoque for Electricals vehicles

automotive

racing driver training, the Sora Racing 1 prototype was designed with five broad principles in mind: a two-seater open cockpit (optimised, real-time instruction, cockpit suited to all morphologies with an adjustable pedal set), easy familiarisation (steering wheel paddles, colour-coded dashboard, 540Nm

interview
YANNICK AMOSSE, R&D MANAGER SORA COMPOSITES

JEC Composites Magazine: What were your main technical objectives with regard to this development? YANNICK AMOSSE: Our objectives were to develop a dry (non-impregnated), deformable, multiaxial carbon fabric, achieve a complete characterization of the material/process pair in order to populate the database of the simulation and calculation software and develop a "low-

sandwich materials are also used. Although the chassis is currently made using thermoset resin injected into a metallic mould, the teams are also working on PA-type thermoplastic resins. The modular design of the LC4 chassis was intended, amongst other things, to enable the integration of metallic couplings for the mechanical links (attaching the front axle / power unit). To guarantee the geometry is correct, assembly is carried out using jigs.

Precise objectives

To obtain a quality product suited to

jec composites magazine / No63 March 2011

JCM: Was the design stage more complicated than the processing stage? Y. A.: Nothing seems complicated when you are so absorbed in it! Nor is it possible, moreover, to separate these two aspects. To optimize the development costs, it is vital to design in accordance with the constraints imposed by the processing method. The processing stage is made all the easier by the fact that the constraints have been taken into account. JCM: On what basis can you posit a ramp-up to 100 units per day?

engine torque), an adaptable power range (for tweaking the car to match the skills of the pilot, with 4 MAPs corresponding to 200, 250, 300 and 360 hp), a safe chassis (FIA CN type approval), and a car with proven credentials (8 vehicles delivered). The objective was also to produce a car with the lowest possible general servicing costs – engine servicing, for example, is only required every 15,000 km. The after-sales service is provided by Sora Composites.

production sites (155,000 m² factory space) in France and Slovakia, three technical centres and a privileged partnership with CEMCAT, and two sales offices in the UK and Germany. 1,200 people work for the group, and its 2009 revenues amounted to €105 million (2/3 in the car sector, 20% from buses and trucks and 10% from agricultural and building machinery). Over the past four years, growth has been part organic, part external. The group is a Tier 1 supplier for bodywork parts made of composites and thermoplastics and a Tier 2 supplier for the painting of plastic and composite parts for the automotive industry. 80% of deliveries have been to Europe and 20% to France. The group is structured around two complementary business lines and two entities: Sotira and SPPP. Sotira (SOciétés de Transformation Industrielle de Résines Armées) specialises in low-pressure injection and compression, thermoplastic injection and GMT compression. Since early 2010, the various Sotira companies have been progressively merging into Sotira Automotive. SPPP (Société de Peinture de Pièces Plastiques) specialises in the painting of plastic and composite parts.

Continued growth

Founded in 1981, the Sora Composites Group has eight main

cost" resin with the required reactivity for optimized injection and impregnation times.

Y. A.: We are developing process/materials pairs that are easy to "industrialize" by limiting or eliminating the "non-repeatable" manual operations. To this end, we combine the automated cutting of fabrics, a preforming line, the automatic loading of preforms, temperaturecontrolled metal moulds, injection machines specifically developed by Sotira, mould release using grippers, machining and reworking using a precise and repeatable robotized cell, production of all other components with finished dimensions (inserts, etc.), assembly using jigs to ensure the geometry of the chassis is correct, no reworking following assembly and a process monitoring plan. The mould cycle time is 25 minutes.

JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #63 - March 2011

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #63 - March 2011