Stress Distribution of Bolted Joint Connection in a Hybrid Composite-Steel Chassis

Stress distribution of bolted joint hybrid composite-steel in a vehicle structure is analyzed in this paper. The analysis was carried out on three different conditions that are when the vehicle in total load, in cornering and braking condition. Finite Element Analysis (FEA) is used to investigate the structural behavior during those three different loading conditions. Different parameters were applied for each simulation. The results show that the maximum stress did not appear in the bolted joint area means the stress on this joint is still below the maximum stress of both composite and steel materials with stress value on this area in full load condition is 62 MPa, 54 MPa in cornering condition and 51 MPa in braking condition. By using this hybrid composite-steel chassis structure a lighter weight is obtained. The simulation shows the chassis weight is reduced by about 22.7% compared to full steel chassis with the same dimension.