Design Analysis and Fabrication of Composite Mono Leaf Spring for Automobile Vehicle

Abstract

Leaf spring is a simple form of suspension spring used to absorb vibrations induced during the motion of a vehicle. The automobile industry has shown increased interest in the replacement of steel leaf spring (65Si7) with composite leaf spring with E-glass/Epoxy due to high strength to weight ratio, higher stiffness, high impact energy absorption and lesser stresses. This research is aimed to investigate the suitability of natural and synthetic fiber reinforced composite material in automobile leaf spring application. By using natural fibers efforts have been made to reduce the cost and weight of leaf spring. A composite leaf spring with E-glass/Epoxy composite materials is modeled and subjected to the same load as that of a steel spring. The composite leaf spring has been modeled by their consideration. Static structural analysis of a leaf spring has been performed using ANSYS 11.