JP2006232198A - Shock absorbing member for vehicle - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a shock absorbing member capable of absorbing shocks applied when a vehicle run into collision and relieving damages to the own vehicle and the object collided with etc. <P>SOLUTION: The shock absorbing member is formed in a hollow structure having approximately a rectangular section equipped with a collision side front wall 1a, a body side rear wall 1b, a top plate 1c, and a bottom plate 1d, and reinforcing plates 2 and 3 are overlapped on and fixed to either or both of the top plate 1c and floor plate 1d in the neighborhood of the coupling part connection surface 11 of the body side rear wall 1b with the body. In fixation of the reinforcing plates, one or more welding bead parts in parallel arrangement are formed by line welding process on the body side and on the collision side approximately along the longitudinal direction of the top plate or bottom plate, and it is favorable that the welding strength on the body side is larger than that on the collision side. When shock is applied due to collision with a vehicle object etc., the area near the coupling part with the body is prevented from being collapsed by pressure prematurely, and it is possible to establish a proper shock absorption until the whole goes in pressure collapse. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to an impact absorbing member that absorbs an impact generated by a vehicle collision or the like to reduce the impact or damage to the host vehicle or a collision object.

  Shock absorbers used in vehicle bumper reinforcement, etc. are formed in a hollow structure with a rectangular cross-section, etc., and the material formed by this hollow structure absorbs collision energy by itself deforming or crushing by impact due to collision etc. This is intended to reduce damage to the vehicle body and colliding objects. The bumper reinforcement is arranged inside the bumper to serve as strength reinforcement, and is supported and fixed to the vehicle body via a stay or the like.

  By the way, the collision forms of a vehicle are various, and there are many collision forms, such as an offset collision and a pole collision. In these collision modes, the impact load is received not at the surface of the impact absorbing member but at a point, and in many cases, occurs near the center of the vehicle body. For this reason, before the shock absorbing member is deformed or crushed as a whole, the load is concentrated on the support portion by the stay and the impact absorbing member is partially buckled and crushed around the stay. If such partial crushing occurs, the impact absorbing member cannot sufficiently absorb the collision energy thereafter, and the collision energy is transmitted to the host vehicle or the collision object.

On the other hand, conventionally, in order to prevent buckling of the shock absorbing member in the vicinity of the stay support portion, the thickness of the shock absorbing member is increased or the strength is increased by assembling a column or rib inside the shock absorbing member. A method (see, for example, Patent Documents 1 and 2) is used. Further, there is a method in which an additional impact absorbing member is retrofitted to the impact surface side of the impact absorbing member (for example, Patent Document 3).
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 7-164983 JP-A-6-286537 Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2001-225663

However, when the strength of the impact absorbing member is increased as described above, the impact absorbing capability is reduced due to the increased strength.
Also, as in Patent Documents 1 and 2, the method of reinforcing by inserting reinforcing ribs and struts inside the shock absorbing member is to bend the extruded hollow material into a curved shape as in the current general manufacturing process. When forming a bumper reinforcement or the like by processing, it is difficult to perform bending after insertion or insertion after bending.
Further, the method of adding a retrofit impact absorbing member as in Patent Document 3 causes an increase in weight and increases the overall volume of the impact absorbing member, which greatly imposes design restrictions. Furthermore, when the object of collision is a human body, there is also a problem that the amount of energy absorption (performance) is insufficient.

  The present invention has been made against the background of the above circumstances, and it is possible to prevent buckling in the vicinity of the stay without impairing the shock absorbing performance, and to maintain good shock absorbing performance over a certain period of time. An object is to provide an absorbent member.

  That is, among the shock absorbers for vehicle bodies of the present invention, the invention according to claim 1 has a substantially rectangular cross-section hollow structure including a collision side front wall, a vehicle body rear wall, a top plate, and a bottom plate, and the vehicle body side. A reinforcing plate is overlapped and fixed to one or both of the top plate and the floor plate in the vicinity of the connecting portion connection surface between the rear wall and the vehicle body side.

  Next, according to the invention of the shock absorbing member for a vehicle according to claim 2, in the invention according to claim 1, the reinforcing plate is fixed by wire fixing or surface fixing.

  According to the invention of the shock absorbing member for a vehicle according to claim 3, in the invention according to claim 1 or 2, the fixing of the reinforcing plate includes line welding substantially along the longitudinal direction of the top plate or the bottom plate. In this case, one or two weld beads arranged in parallel are formed on the vehicle body side and the collision side, respectively, by the wire welding.

  According to a fourth aspect of the invention of the shock absorbing member for vehicles, in the third aspect of the invention, the wire welding is performed by laser welding.

  According to the invention of the impact absorbing member for a vehicle according to claim 5, in the invention according to claim 3 or 4, in the wire welding, the welding strength on the vehicle body side is larger than the welding strength on the collision side. It is characterized by.

  According to the invention for a shock absorbing member for a vehicle according to claim 6, in the invention according to any one of claims 3 to 5, the number of weld beads on the vehicle body side is larger than the number of weld beads on the collision side. It is characterized by becoming.

In other words, according to the present invention, the shock absorbing member formed in the hollow structure has the reinforcing plate in the vicinity of the vehicle body side connecting connection surface, thereby increasing the strength in the vicinity of the vehicle body side connecting portion without causing an overall increase in strength. When the impact load is concentrated on the vehicle body side connecting portion, it can be partially increased, and the impact absorbing member is prevented from being partially buckled and collapsed near the connecting portion, thereby promoting deformation throughout the shock absorbing member. . Thereby, the impact energy applied to the impact absorbing member is effectively absorbed, and the energy absorption is continuously performed.
The reinforcing plate is overlapped and fixed to at least one of the top plate and the bottom plate of the shock absorbing member, and is bent when the shock absorbing member is manufactured by bending using a hollow extruded material. The configuration of the present invention can be obtained by superimposing and fixing a reinforcing plate on the impact absorbing member. Further, since the plates are overlapped, the increase in bulk can be almost ignored, and the increase in weight is also slight.

In addition, the reinforcement plate should just be provided in at least one of the top plate and bottom plate which comprise an impact-absorbing member. The fixing surface of the reinforcing plate may be either the top plate or the inner and outer surfaces of the bottom plate, but is usually provided on the outer surface.
Further, the reinforcing plate is provided on at least one of the top plate and the bottom plate in the vicinity of the vehicle body side rear wall of the shock absorbing member and the connecting portion connecting surface on the vehicle body side. The reinforcing plate is preferably arranged so as to extend left and right with respect to the width direction center of the connection surface, and the width direction center of the reinforcement plate substantially coincides with the width direction center of the connection surface. Is more desirable. Further, the width and depth of the reinforcing plate are not particularly limited, but the width is preferably larger than the width of the connection surface. The depth is preferably the same as the top plate or the bottom plate.

  Next, the method of fixing the reinforcing plate is not particularly limited as the present invention. Since the reinforcing plate is superimposed on the top plate or the bottom plate and exhibits a reinforcing effect at the time of impact load, the fixing needs to be performed so as to obtain the action. As a fixing method, any of point fixing, line fixing, and surface fixing may be used, or a combination thereof may be used. However, in the case of using only point fixing, stress concentrates on the point fixing part and the reinforcing effect is reduced, so that it is desirable to mainly use line fixing or surface fixing.

Also, the fixing method is not particularly limited in the present invention, and various methods can be adopted, such as laser welding, fusion welding such as MIG and TIG, adhesive, mechanical fixing such as rivet and caulking, and the like. Can be used. Laser welding or fusion welding is suitable as a method of wire fixing, and laser welding has an advantage that welding distortion hardly occurs and strength reduction due to heat during welding is slight. On the other hand, fusion welding has a disadvantage in that the welding marks are made of material and the side of the weld line is raised, and the strain is large and the strength tends to decrease due to heat during welding.
Further, the adhesive is suitable for surface fixing, and the fixing work is easy. However, there is a disadvantage in that the fixing strength tends to be insufficient.
Furthermore, mechanical fixation is suitable for point fixation, and the reinforcing plate can be firmly fixed. However, there is a disadvantage in that stress concentrates on the fixing portion and the top plate and the bottom plate are easily broken. Therefore, line fixing by laser welding is the most suitable method. Laser welding minimizes strength reduction due to thermal strain and the like as described above, and there is almost no swell of welding marks.

Further, it is preferable that the wire is mainly formed by forming one or two or more parallel weld beads on the vehicle body side and the collision side substantially along the longitudinal direction of the top plate or the bottom plate. The weld bead exhibits a good fixing force by dispersing stress when an impact is applied to the impact absorbing member and the impact absorbing member is deformed, and the partial reinforcing action of the impact absorbing member is effective. Is obtained.
The plurality of weld beads are formed for the following reason.
Since the shock absorbing member and the reinforcing plate have different deformation forms at the time of collision, if a force of a certain level or more is applied, the reinforcing effect is weakened and the shock absorbing member is cracked. In order to prevent this crack, simply increasing the strength of wire welding has little effect, and ideally, the surface is fixed and the shock absorbing member and the reinforcing plate are deformed in the same shape. However, even if the width of laser welding is widened, laser welding is performed in the shape of ▼, so that it is difficult to obtain the desired effect, and thermal degradation on the shock absorbing member side is undesirable. Thus, by performing parallel wire welding, the same effect as that obtained by surface fixing can be obtained. The weld beads arranged in parallel may be spaced apart from each other and may be formed so as to partially overlap.

In the above-mentioned weld bead, it is desirable that the welding strength on the vehicle body side is larger than the welding strength on the collision side. For example, the number of welding beads on the vehicle body side is larger than that on the collision side. To do.
The reason is that if the plate is sufficiently strengthened by wire welding on the collision side and the deformation forms of the shock absorbing member and the reinforcing plate are integrated, the peak load at the time of collision, which is desirably as low as possible, increases. On the contrary, if it is not fixed or easily peeled off at the time of collision, the reinforcing effect is lost. Therefore, it is desirable that the wire welding on the collision side is welded so as not to be peeled off at the time of the collision and has a welding strength lower than that of the vehicle body. This realization can be achieved by adjusting the welding depth and the welding width, but it is easy in construction to make the number of welding beads different.

  The material of the impact absorbing member and the reinforcing plate is not limited, but an aluminum alloy is desirable due to workability and light weight. As the shock absorbing member, it is desirable to use JIS A6000 series or 7000 series. The reinforcing plate is preferably a JIS A5000 series or 6000 series aluminum alloy.

  As described above, the vehicle impact absorbing member of the present invention has a substantially rectangular cross-sectional hollow structure including a collision side front wall, a vehicle body rear wall, a top plate, and a bottom plate, and the vehicle body rear wall and the vehicle body side. In the vicinity of the connecting surface of the connecting portion, a reinforcing plate is superimposed and fixed on one or both of the top plate and the floor plate, so that when it receives an impact due to a collision with a vehicle, etc., it is connected to the vehicle body side. It is possible to prevent the vicinity of the part from being crushed early and to obtain appropriate shock absorption until the whole is crushed. Further, since the effect is obtained with the flat reinforcing plate, the weight increase is slight, the bulk is hardly increased, and the design is not restricted.

  Note that the fixing of the reinforcing plate includes line welding substantially along the longitudinal direction of the top plate or the bottom plate, and one or two weld beads arranged in parallel on the vehicle body side and the collision side by the line welding, respectively. If the weld strength on the vehicle body side is larger than the weld strength on the collision side, the shock absorbing energy is effectively absorbed without increasing the peak load at the time of the collision. It becomes possible.

(Embodiment 1)
Below, the impact-absorbing member 1 for vehicles of one Embodiment of this invention is demonstrated based on FIG.
A long extruded material having a substantially rectangular cross-section hollow structure is obtained by extrusion molding of an aluminum alloy, and the vehicle impact absorbing member 1 is obtained by bending. The vehicle impact absorbing member 1 includes a collision side front wall 1a and a vehicle body side rear wall 1b facing each other, and also includes a top plate 1c and a bottom plate 1d facing each other. Further, a rib 1e is formed in the interior from the inner surface of the collision side front wall 1a to the inner surface of the vehicle body side rear wall 1b. The rib 1e is integrally formed by the extrusion. In the present invention, the rib 1e may not be provided, and the manufacturing method is not limited to extrusion.

  As shown in FIG. 1, the shock absorbing member 1 includes reinforcing plates 2 on the top surface of the top plate 1c and the bottom surface of the bottom plate 1d, respectively, in the vicinity of the planned connection surface position where the mounting stay 10 is attached to the vehicle body. 3 are stacked and fixed. The reinforcing plates 2 and 3 have the same depth as the top plate 1c and the bottom plate 1d, and have a width slightly exceeding the width of the connection surface on both sides.

The shock absorbing member 1 is attached to a vehicle body (not shown) in the state shown in FIG.
That is, the connection plates 11 and 11 are fixed to the tips of the stays 10 and 10 provided on both sides of the vehicle body, and the vehicle body side rear wall 1b of the shock absorbing member 1 is fixed via the connection plates 11 and 11. The fixing method of the connection plate 11 and the vehicle body side rear wall 1b is not specifically limited, It can fix by appropriate means, such as a rivet, a bolt nut, and welding. The overlapping surface of the connection plate 11 and the vehicle body side rear wall 1b is the connection surface. A bumper 12 is disposed and fixed on the collision side from the shock absorbing member 1. The impact absorbing member 1 may be disposed either in front of or behind the vehicle, or may be disposed in both. Moreover, although the said impact-absorbing member 1 is demonstrated as what is used as bumper reinforcement, the impact-absorbing member of this invention can also be used as a structural material of a bumper.
In the above description, the reinforcing plate is provided on both the top plate and the bottom plate. However, the reinforcing plate may be provided on either one.

Next, a preferable fixing structure of the reinforcing plate to the shock absorbing member will be described with reference to FIGS. 2 and 3A.
The reinforcing plates 2 and 3 are fixed to the top plate 1c on the vehicle body side by two weld beads 4 and 4 formed so as to be parallel along the longitudinal direction of the top plate 1c or the bottom plate 1d. It is fixed to the top plate 1c by one weld bead 5 formed along the longitudinal direction of the top plate or the bottom plate. Further, the welding beads 4 and 5 are fixed to the top plate 1c by three welding beads 6 ... 6 formed at right angles to the welding beads 4 and 5. Each of the weld beads 4, 5, 6 is formed by laser welding.

The reinforcing plates 2 and 3 prevent the shock absorbing member 1 from being partially collapsed in the vicinity of the stay 10 when an impact is applied to the shock absorbing member 1. It is possible to uniformly deform and crush, and to effectively absorb the shock absorption energy. Further, the reinforcing pre-rates 2 and 3 do not increase the strength of the entire shock absorbing member 1, but improve the shock absorbing performance while keeping the load peak when the shock is applied low.
As described above, the present invention has been described based on the above embodiment, but the present invention is not limited to the above description of the present embodiment, and is modified as a vehicle impact absorbing member without departing from the scope of the present invention. Is possible.

Next, examples of the present invention will be described by comparing with comparative examples and conventional examples.
A shock absorbing member having a reinforcing plate fixed by the fixing structure shown in the above embodiment is prepared as an invention example, and a comparative example in which a reinforcing plate is not provided on either the top plate or the bottom plate (conventional example) is prepared. . Furthermore, Reference Example 1 with one weld bead on both the vehicle body side and the collision side and Reference Example 2 with two weld beads on both the vehicle body side and the collision side were prepared. The outline of these is shown in FIGS.

For the above invention example, the conventional example and the reference example 1, an impact test was performed in which an impact was applied from the collision side toward the connection plate. FIG. 4 shows a state where the impact absorbing member is deformed by the impact test.
In the case of the product of the present invention in which the reinforcing plate is welded to the impact absorbing member, when the impact is applied to the impact absorbing member, the deformation process of gradually projecting outwards at the top plate 1c and the bottom plate 1d proceeds. The reinforcing plate is also deformed so as to be pushed by the convex deformation of the shock absorbing member. In particular, in the case where two welding beads parallel to the connection surface are provided on the vehicle body side as in the example of the invention and the welding strength on the vehicle body side is selectively increased, the deformation of the reinforcing plate proceeds with the deformation of the shock absorbing member. In the shock absorption capacity, it gradually stabilizes from the peak immediately after the collision until it collapses until it collapses.

On the other hand, in the conventional example, the top plate and the bottom plate of the shock absorbing member were quickly crushed.
In Reference Example 1 in which there is one weld bead on both the collision side and the vehicle body side, stress may be concentrated in the vicinity of the weld bead on the vehicle body side depending on the impact load, resulting in breakage. When the reinforcing plate breaks, the second peak occurs or the strength sharply decreases, so that the shock absorbing ability is not stable, and a good shock absorbing ability cannot be obtained. Therefore, the above invention example in which the welding strength on the vehicle body side is increased is more preferable.

  Next, regarding the invention example, the conventional example, and the reference examples 1 and 2, assuming the stress concentration due to the stay, the shock absorber is disposed with the vehicle body side, that is, the vehicle body side rear wall facing upward, and the load is applied from above. The load stroke amount and the load when applied downward were measured, and the results are shown in a graph in FIG. 5 as the relationship between the stroke amount and the load. In addition, the same measurement as described above was performed for Reference Example 3 in which the thickness constituting the shock absorbing member was increased so that the load maintenance after the load peak was equivalent to that of the above-described invention example.

As a result of the above measurement, it can be seen that the example of the present invention does not have a high load peak, and the load is maintained for a long time and has a good shock absorbing performance.
On the other hand, in the conventional example, after a high load peak appears at an early stage, it can be seen that the load is abruptly decreased, and the shock absorbing performance is inferior.
Further, in Reference Example 1 in which one weld bead is formed on both the collision side and the vehicle body side, although the load peak is equivalent to that of the invention example, the subsequent load decrease amount is larger than that of the invention example, and the impact peak is higher than that of the invention example. The absorption performance is inferior. However, it shows better shock absorbing performance than the conventional example.
Further, in Reference Example 2 in which two weld beads are formed on both the collision side and the vehicle body side, the load peak is high, and the impact may be transmitted to the vehicle body side and the collision object side depending on the impact. Note that the amount of decrease in load after the peak is small. Also in Reference Example 2, when there is no problem with the load peak, the shock absorbing performance better than the conventional example is shown.
Further, in Reference Example 3, although the load maintenance after the load peak was good, the load peak was as high as that in Reference Example 2. Moreover, the weight increase by making Oshida material thick is clear.

It is a perspective view which shows the state which attached the impact-absorbing member of one Embodiment of this invention to the vehicle body side. It is sectional drawing which shows one Embodiment of this invention. It is a top view which shows the invention example in the Example of this invention, a prior art example, and the reference examples 1 and 2 partially. It is explanatory drawing which shows the deformation | transformation behavior when an impact is added to the invention example in the Example of this invention, a prior art example, and reference examples 1 and 2. FIG. Similarly, it is a graph which shows a load-stroke amount curve.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Shock absorption member 1a Collision side front wall 1b Car body side rear wall 1c Top plate 1d Bottom plate 2 Reinforcement plate 4 Welding bead 5 Welding bead 6 Welding bead

Claims (6)

  A substantially rectangular cross-section hollow structure including a collision-side front wall, a vehicle-body-side rear wall, a top plate, and a bottom plate, and one of the top plate and the floor plate in the vicinity of a connection portion connection surface between the vehicle-body-side rear wall and the vehicle body side Or the impact-absorbing member for vehicles, wherein a reinforcing plate is superimposed and fixed on both.   2. The vehicle impact absorbing member according to claim 1, wherein the reinforcing plate is fixed by wire fixing or surface fixing.   The fixing of the reinforcing plate includes line welding substantially along the longitudinal direction of the top plate or bottom plate, and one or two weld beads arranged in parallel on the vehicle body side and the collision side by the line welding, respectively. The impact-absorbing member for a vehicle according to claim 1 or 2, wherein   4. The impact absorbing member for a vehicle according to claim 3, wherein the wire welding is performed by laser welding.   5. The vehicle impact absorbing member according to claim 3, wherein in the wire welding, a welding strength on a vehicle body side is larger than a welding strength on a collision side.   6. The vehicle impact absorbing member according to claim 3, wherein the number of the weld beads on the vehicle body side is greater than the number of weld beads on the collision side.

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