Plastic wheels may be coming to production cars

Posted Thu Jun 21 2007 10:01 AM by Kenneth Hall

Light-weight alloy wheels may one day be replaced by even lighter plastic wheels or advanced composite versions. A new testing system has been developed that will allow manufacturers to simulate tests for the wheels in the hope that they’ll one day feature on production cars. The benefits of plastic wheels are their lower costs and lighter mass.

Plastic specialists, who developed the wheels using glass-reinforced plastic (GRP) components some time ago, have never been able to test them to meet industry safety regulations. However, that may change with a new simulation developed by Europe’s Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft research facility.

According to a department manager at Fraunhofer, Andreas Büter, who spoke recently with reporters from Automobilwoche, the simulations use tomography imaging to determine the length, curvature and density of the glass fibers used in the wheel. Those parameters, he says, are crucial for the firmness and maximum stress of the material.

This will allow them to forecast how the wheel may react to impacts to a curb or from a crash, as well as long-term reliability. So far, some prototype examples have been tested successfully beyond 250,000km.

Reader Comments

Thu Jun 21 2007 11:04 AM
JamesB says

What about heat? Won\'t the wheels melt under the very high temperature of brakes after heavy usage?
Thu Jun 21 2007 2:23 PM
ultima says

there are certain treatments that can be done to plastic that can make it very heat resistant (teflon is a plastic and is used in constructing non-stick frying pans, just to give you an example), so hopefully that shouldnt be too much of a problem.
Thu Jun 21 2007 4:43 PM
FRANCELOS says

Back in the 70Â´s The Citroen SM was allready equipped with resin wheells developped by Michelin.
Then came the "MIddle Age" with the barbarians and the oblivion.......
Now itÂ´s news...again !
Round and round you go...spinning wheels
Fri Jun 22 2007 8:20 AM
RichardE says

Those were resin wheels, this is plastic. Just because it\'s been tried before doesnt mean its not news. I wonder what the rappers will think of them?

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