German bicycle producer Urwahn Bikes has launched a restricted version model of its SOFTRIDE bicycle platform that includes a 3D printed titanium alloy body.
Quite than creating a brand new body design, the producer has utilized the brand new course of to the prevailing SOFTRIDE, preserving its geometry and structural idea unchanged and altering solely the fabric system. This technique is much like approaches utilized in aerospace and medical purposes, the place freezing the design and altering a single variable permits the results of a brand new materials or course of to be evaluated extra straight.
Beforehand produced utilizing 3D printed metal, the SOFTRIDE now in titanium Ti64 achieves a body weight beneath 1.45 kg. In doing so, the producer is positioning the bicycle in a phase usually dominated by carbon.
Sebastian Meinecke, Managing Director at Urwahn, says the challenge is targeted on structural growth somewhat than status. By prioritizing materials conduct over visible change, the SOFTRIDE Ti64 exhibits how superior manufacturing and excessive efficiency supplies could be utilized to future mobility ideas.
Reengineering the SOFTRIDE in titanium
The challenge additionally represents a case of AM being utilized to a major construction somewhat than to secondary elements. Despite the fact that absolutely metallic 3D printed bicycle frames have been in the marketplace for greater than a decade, most metallic AM use within the sector nonetheless concentrates on smaller, extremely harassed elements resembling joints or mounting options.
On this case, the load paths and general traits of the body rely upon the 3D printed titanium elements themselves, putting larger emphasis on long run fatigue conduct and structural stability.
Having chosen titanium Ti64, a fabric valued for its energy to weight ratio, fatigue resistance, and steady mechanical properties over time, the body impacts each pressure transmission and vibration administration. The SOFTRIDE’s suspended rear part stays a part of the design, so these results complement the platform’s present suspension idea somewhat than changing it.
Alongside the change in materials and manufacturing technique, the challenge additionally exhibits how the SOFTRIDE platform is getting used throughout completely different configurations. The body is meant to assist a number of drivetrain choices, together with belt drives, gearbox programs resembling Pinion Good.Shift, and electrical help.
The identical body idea is getting used for each typical and electrical variations, with the electrical configuration integrating the MAHLE X20 system. This light-weight system permits the SOFTRIDE Ti64 to retain its dealing with whereas delivering responsive and environment friendly electrical help, in keeping with Mahle SmartBike Programs.
3D printing titanium bicycle frames
From a sturdiness and lifecycle perspective, titanium’s resistance to corrosion and its response to repeated load cycles are related for long run use in each city and efficiency oriented using. This makes it a fascinating manufacturing materials for bicycles, and is being more and more employed hand in hand with 3D printing inside the cycle sector.
For example, bicycle producer Titan Tremendous Bond developed a completely 3D printed titanium alloy bicycle body utilizing the BLT-A320 system from Vivid Laser Applied sciences (BLT). In doing so, the producer produced structural elements resembling head tubes and handlebars, addressing deformation management and weight discount in components with wall thicknesses as little as 0.9 mm.
The method decreased manufacturing cycles by about 30% and materials use by greater than 20% whereas assembly dimensional accuracy necessities of 0.03 mm. This indicators that high-end bicycle manufacturing has begun treating metallic AM as a sensible manufacturing route for full, load-bearing body constructions.
Elsewhere, metallic 3D printer producer Eplus3D partnered with Möve to develop the Avian e-bike with a titanium body based mostly on 3D printed lugs produced on the large-format EP-M650 metallic PBF system. The strategy changed hydroforming and tooling with printed Ti6Al4V lugs and connectors, enabling full battery integration and tighter tolerances.
Help constructions had been minimized by means of parameter optimization, decreasing post-processing and materials waste. The lugs had been bonded somewhat than welded, and floor ending was finished by abrasive blasting. Consequently, the challenge shortened growth time by about six months.
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Featured picture exhibits a technician assembling a bicycle body part in a workshop. Photograph by way of Mahle SmartBike Programs.