UBC and Toyota Reinvent the Wheel?

October 12, 2011

The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, and automaker Toyota have received a federal grant to develop a new process for producing stronger, lighter, and lower-cost aluminum wheels.

The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) has given $727,000 from its Automotive Partnership Canada program to refine the manufacturing process for water-cooled die casting – a next-step process beyond the industry standard of cooling with compressed air. Toyota will provide more than $1 million, personnel, equipment, and other resources for the project.

UBC and Toyota are planning to have the technology deployed by 2014 at the Canadian Autoparts Toyota Inc. (CAPTIN) manufacturing plant in Delta, B.C. The plant employs 250 people and has the capacity to turn out 1.7 million wheels a year.

“This isn’t about reinventing the wheel, it’s about reinventing the process to make the wheel to drive down manufacturing costs,” said Steve Cockcroft, UBC professor of materials engineering.

Aluminum wheels are considered one of the most challenging parts to make because of safety requirements and the need for extensive styling and finishing. Using a water-cooled method for casting molten aluminum into a die creates a lighter but stronger product in less time.

However, CAPTIN wants to refine this proven process further by reducing the number of cavities and pores that form within the metal, lowering costs to make and maintain the dies, and minimizing excess aluminum.

“CAPTIN needs to maintain its competitiveness in the face of lower labor costs in Mexico and China,” said CAPTIN President Deryl Sturdevant. “This grant, and UBC’s contribution of expertise, is critical to our long-term success as an automotive parts manufacturing facility in Canada.”

UBC has been collaborating with CAPTIN to develop a computer model for optimizing the design of low-pressure die casting. This type of research is what led to Toyota transferring its die design operations from Japan to Delta in 2003.

By using CAD to understand the fundamental science happening in the casting process, the research team expects to rein in the water-cooled technique’s costs.

“Casting as a technology is very old, dating back to approximately 3,000 BC, so you would think we would know precisely what is happening in a modern casting process. Yet the fact is we don’t,” Cockcroft said. “It’s an exceedingly complex process involving the transport of heat and mass across a range of scales, from meters to a millionth of a meter. The mathematical models we will apply in this program, which will take up to a week to run on the latest generation of computer servers, will enable us to accomplish something that is just too complex using more conventional, experience-based approaches.”

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