Fuel Tank Reinforcing Element with Rotating Links
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Solution Overview
Problem
Fuel tanks, especially those in hybrid vehicles, face issues with non-parallel top and bottom surfaces due to manufacturing tolerances, thermal deformations, and stress concentration from pressurization, leading to potential breakage under high stress conditions.
Innovation Solution
A fuel tank design featuring a reinforcing element with rotating links that allows for stress distribution and flexibility, reducing stress concentrations and enhancing creep resistance, while maintaining tank deformation control and flexibility during impacts.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Strength
If a traditional reinforcing element is used to enhance mechanical strength and creep resistance, then the tank can withstand pressurization, but stress concentrations occur at localized regions leading to potential breakage
Solution Approach 1:
The reinforcing element incorporates a rotating link mechanism that allows dynamic adjustment of the reinforcement geometry. This enables the structure to adapt to varying stress distributions caused by non-parallel tank surfaces, preventing stress concentration at fixed points while maintaining overall mechanical strength under pressurization conditions.
Solution Approach 2:
The rotating link allows change in the geometric parameters of the reinforcing element (angle, position) based on the actual alignment between top and bottom tank surfaces. This parameter adjustment optimizes stress distribution across the reinforcement, eliminating localized stress peaks that would occur with fixed-geometry reinforcements.
2Loss of substance
If the tank is pressurized to eliminate vapor generation, then vapor loss is reduced, but deformations from pressurization add to fuel weight deformations increasing stress on the tank
Solution Approach 1:
The rotating link mechanism provides dynamic compliance that allows the reinforcing element to accommodate combined deformations from both pressurization and fuel weight. This dynamic adaptation distributes the additional stresses generated by pressurization across a broader area, preventing stress concentration even when the tank operates at elevated pressures to minimize vapor loss.
3Ease of manufacture
If the top and bottom surfaces of the tank are non-parallel due to manufacturing tolerances and thermal deformations, then manufacturing is easier, but traditional reinforcing elements concentrate stresses leading to breakage
Solution Approach 1:
The rotating link enables the reinforcing element to dynamically compensate for non-parallelism between top and bottom tank surfaces. Instead of requiring precise parallel manufacturing, the system adapts to the actual surface alignment, distributing stresses evenly across the reinforcement regardless of manufacturing variations or thermal deformations.
Solution Approach 2:
The rotating link mechanism introduces asymmetry in the reinforcement geometry that matches the asymmetric non-parallel surfaces of the tank. This asymmetric adaptation allows optimal stress distribution across the varying gap between surfaces, whereas a symmetric fixed-geometry reinforcement would create stress concentrations.
Data Source
AI summary
A fuel tank having two opposite wall portions and at least one reinforcing element connecting these two wall portions, such reinforcing element comprising at least two parts linked by at least one rotating link. A method for manufacturing such tank.