The new material layout generated by Inspire provided a concept that not only met the performance targets but was also lighter than the original.
Chris then took this model and used his own design know-how to generate suitable geometry around the concept for additive manufacturing.
The Results: Stronger and Lighter
The ultimate aim of the project was weight saving, and the resulting parts are designed for maximum strength with minimum weight. Chris noted, "We took the seat post bracket from 360 grams down to 200 grams."
After seeing the huge weight saving achieved on this single component, Renishaw and Empire’s
scope suddenly expanded.
“Where we’d thought about extruded or hydroformed aluminum tubing or even carbon fiber for the frame, bonded onto some titanium bits, we started to look at doing even more." Chris explained that the use of the standard frame materials really inhibited the design freedom. "We looked at the likes of the main aluminum frame and realized that component weighed 2100g on it’s own; at that point we knew we could help to create something equally as strong and shave a huge amount of the weight off. From there, the idea that we could use additive manufacturing to create all of the major frame components came together.”
In terms of strength, the Inspire influenced seat post bracket has already been tested to the British Standards, which includes exerting 1,200 newtons applied and released for 50,000 cycles at no more than 25 hertz.
“We thought why not test to destruction and see how strong it really is – so far it has exceeded the standard 6 times, at 300,000 cycles and counting. This is after stress relief only; we are
planning advanced heat treatments, such as Hot Isostatic Pressing (HIP) which could improve the properties even further."
What’s Next
The benefits of the interaction between solidThinking Inspire and additive manufacturing are obvious. Inspire offers the best way to create load driven structures and enables the industry to unlock the enormous lightweight design potential related to use of additive manufactured structures.