Simplified Modeling of Cross Members in Vehicle Design

This paper focus on creating simplified models for platelike automotive parts which can be used for crashworthiness analysis. Other than the traditional ways that used shell elements with coarse meshing to model plate-like parts for a simplified vehicle model, this paper tried to use superelement and equivalent beam methods to re-model such parts. In this paper, both methods are presented separately and two simplified chassis models are generated applying the two methods. The efficiency of the developed simplified models as well as the presented modeling methods are evaluated and compared through crashworthiness analyses, and finally positive results are achieved.