Keep It Light
Welcome to the new ar engineers GmbH newsletter. Nice that you have decided to stay up-to-date with us. In our newsletter we talk about the latest lightweight construction topics keeping you up to date about ar engineers. You can also read exciting articles about our own developments of the sailing dinghy "arONE" or our webtool calcbond , the innovative platform for the design and calculation of bonded joints.
General news
A little more than half the year has now gone by and a lot has already happened. Especially in the first quarter, we worked hard on the re-launch of the commercial version of calcbond, which we rolled out in March. In addition, the construction phase for two units of our International 14 sailing dinghy, the arONE, went into the final stretch, so that the two dinghies could successfully participate in the European Championship in May.
We are also particularly proud of the launch of our new homepage and the associated newsletter, the first issue of which you are currently reading. We hope that we can bring you closer to the portfolio of ar engineers with our content and, above all, that we can communicate well the latest projects on which we are working. This is particularly important to us because, as you will read, we are constantly expanding our lightweight engineering expertise in our own developments or in our public research projects to sharpen our view of sustainable engineering design.
2023 is also a year of trade fairs for us. We have rediscovered the trade fair for ourselves, especially after the Corona years, and visited the BOOT in Düsseldorf, the JEC World in Paris and also the AIX in Hamburg. We were able to maintain many existing contacts and also made some exciting new ones. We are already looking forward to our next event in autumn, where we will visit the Airtec trade fair in Augsburg.
Recent Industry Projects
And what does our industrial life look like? As you can read on our homepage, we work in various industries. We think that is very important. Over the last 13 years, we have applied our lightweight engineering expertise in various industries to help you realize your projects in the most professional way. More sustainable products, lighter structures or keeping tight project schedules have often been the driving motivation.
At present, shipbuilding and automotive engineering are the dominant themes in our engineering work. In particular, this involves the targeted saving of weight with the simultaneous simplification of components. The advantage? Savings in material and manufacturing to achieve overall cost savings!
Lightweight engineering is in demand in all industries in order to save resources. In addition, sustainable structures are also always directly linked to lightweight engineering in order to improve their carbon footprint. Read on our homepage and in the newsletter how we manage this for you.
Development of a hybrid composite boat for Fassmer
The Fassmer shipyard in northern Germany commissioned us to reduce the structural weight of a hybrid boat that can be used either as a tender or as a lifeboat. The boat’s main structure is made entirely of GFRP laminate. The structural weight should become as minimal as possible to save manufacturing time and costs. The boat's stiffness and strength were used as design parameters for checking the quality of the results.
Calculation of a GRP dome for EM-fiberglas
Composites are also in demand in civil engineering. The ARoS Art Museum in Aarhus, Denmark, is getting a new giant work of art with The Dome. We at ar engineers are supporting our customer EM-fiberglas A/S in the verification of the GRP formwork, which plays a supporting role in the construction of this large concrete dome.
Furling boom for Mainfurl A/S
The Danish manufacturer Mainfurl has commissioned us with the FEM analysis of GRP and CFRP furling booms for sailing yachts. Especially the global stiffness and buckling safety are critical for such highly loaded components. At the same time, they have to meet specific aesthetic requirements and be as light as possible.
Optimisation of a composite motorcycle frame
We are also very active in the automotive sector this year. For a German customer, we are conducting extensive FEM calculations and optimisation of a fibre composite motorbike frame. Our efficient analysis and optimisation methods enable significant savings in material costs and development time!
F&E-Projekte (Hy-FiVE, E2MUT, FAnTeStick)
News on Hy-FiVE
In the publicly funded research project "Hy-FiVE", innovative joining technologies for joining fibre composite and metal components for shipbuilding applications are being developed. We at ar engineers have developed calculation models for the hybrid FAUSST connector and thus improved the mechanical characterisation of this new joining technology through 3D simulation. The final phase of the project will now focus on demonstrating the applicability of the hybrid FAUSST applicability by means of demonstrator assemblies.
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News on FAnTeStick
Together with the Leibniz Institut für Verbundwerkstoffe in Kaiserlautern, we conducted researchon?the fatigue analysis and test procedures for the design of GRP bonded joints in the ZIM project "FAnTeStick" from October 2020 to June 2023. In the final phase of the project, the first scientific paper on the influence of the stacking sequence on the fatigue behaviour of lap-shear specimens was published at the 38th ICAF conference in Delft.
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News on E2MUT
In the E2MUT joint project, we are working closely with Fraunhofer IGP and the Tamsen Maritim shipyard in Rostock, among others, to develop concepts for electrically powered ferries with lightweight hydrofoil systems. Our focus is on the structural design and integration of adaptive CFRP hydrofoils with integrated sensor technology for continuous load measurement during operation. In the past six months, several foil configurations have already been developed and initial concepts for sensor-based load reconstruction in foiling operation have been worked out.
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Tech Corner
If you are interested in interesting facts about the technical aspects of our work, you will find them here. In the Tech Corner we get down to the nitty-gritty: you can expect exciting facts and insights into engineering disciplines in lightweight design - simulation, fibre composite technology, structural optimisation, adhesive bonding technology, software development and much more!
Crashsimulation with LS-DYNA
In automotive engineering, the safety of occupants and pedestrians depends to a large extent on the crashworthiness of the vehicle. Optimal design of the vehicle body in terms of crash behaviour ensures that people are maximally protected in traffic accidents. The dynamic simulation of crash situations is a key discipline for the efficient development of lighter and safer vehicle components.
While many structural components in lightweight engineering can be designed and verified to a certain degree using simple, linear-static calculations, crash simulations have to take into account a whole range of non-linearities that a linear-static finite element analysis does not cover, such as, for example:
For precise, realistic mapping of these relationships, special programmes are required that offer suitable modelling options and solution algorithms (explicit time integration).
Our standard tool for such applications is LS-DYNA. It is one of the most advanced and renowned FEM software systems, used by over 80% of automotive OEMs to simulate component, occupant and pedestrian safety. LS-DYNA offers complex non-linear material models for metals, plastics and composites, as well as a wide range of modelling and control options. Coupled with our extensive experience and expertise in the design and calculation of composite components, we ensure that your component meets the highest safety and lightweight construction requirements.
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Further topics
After the launch of the public beta version of calcbond in June 2022, our innovative online platform for the design and calculation of bonded joints has also been made commercially available in March 2023! In addition to improvements and extensions of the analytical toolbox and the AutoFEA module, we have completely revised the Wiki system in the recent months. Now you can expect a new, clearer and much more comprehensive knowledge database on all kinds of topics related to bonding technology at wiki.calcbond.com. Furthermore, we are currently working intensively on the implementation of user-defined material cards for adhesives in calcbond – soon you will be able to enter and save your own data in calcbond, use it for calculations and share it with other selected calcbond users!
arONE / Jibe Set
In May this year, the European Championships of the International 14 dinghies took place on Lake Como in Italy. In the past 12 months, ar engineers GmbH has supported Jibe Set Composites UG in the realisation of the new development of the latest design, the arONE. Special focus was put on the development of the mould design and the creation of production drawings. The boats are characterised in particular by extreme lightweight construction and, as you can guess from the photo, are subjected to heavy loads from wind and water. The global structure and the CFRP laminates were designed using analytical and numerical calculation methods. The baptism of fire at the championship was a complete success. Even on the second day of racing, when the wind was up to 25 knots, the structure held up and the boat performed optimally. This is primarily a result of professional structural design and boatbuilding implementation and shows how important a design using FEM is and how it makes a highly stressed structure plannable.
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Dear Reader
That's it for the first issue of the ar engineers newsletter! We hope that we have been able to bring you closer to our company and increase your curiosity about engineering in lightweight construction. If you would like to know more about the topics presented, please contact us. We will show you how you can best benefit from our lightweight engineering expertise - so that you can achieve your goals more easily.
Many thanks and best regards,
yours
ar engineers GmbH
Ingenieurbüro
Kühneh?fe 20
22761 Hamburg
+49 (0) 40 228 680 980