Tailor Metal™ structures, Dana’s revolutionary venture into multi-metallic structure fabrication, is creating a new generation of vehicle structure designs.

Vehicles have traditionally used monocoque structural architecture, wherein the “skin,” or exterior of the vehicle, supports much of the vehicle’s weight.  This architecture plays a primary role in structural integrality in both quasi-static conditions, such as those occurring during daily driving, and in dynamic conditions that occur in a collision.  It is also a significant factor in the vehicle’s exterior styling and NVH performance, or noise, vibration, and harshness.

On a vehicle equipped with a space frame, such as a NASCAR race car, the skin is principally non-structural, providing styling, aerodynamics, and weather protection.  Conversely, the internal skeleton, or space frame, supports the entire load, even if the skin is ruptured.  Space frames play the primary structural role during quasi-static and dynamic events. 

By minimizing the role of the skin in structural performance, vehicle designers could enjoy greater freedom when shaping the vehicle’s exterior. 

As automakers seek ways to make vehicles lighter, Dana’s structural-solutions engineers are exploring opportunities presented by space frame technology, hydroforming, and multi-metallic pulse-weld joining.  While some suppliers have substituted aluminum or composites in place of steel to reduce weight (single-material architecture), Dana is taking a concurrent, multi-material approach – in a single, contiguous structure – through its Tailor Metal structure technology.  The approach combines steel, stainless steel, aluminum, magnesium, and even titanium using magnetic-pulse welding. By using specific materials in strategic places, engineers are creating lighter and stronger structures.

However, this is only the beginning.  Recently, Dana engineers conceived and patented a way to pulse-join composites and metallics to extend the breadth of structure composition.  Several projects involving multi-metallic architecture and alternative structure technology are in development.