From jet fighters to supercars: Why McLaren is using carbon tape
It might seem as though some technologies underpinning automotive engineering never evolve, but that’s not the case in reality. On the face of it, carbonfibre falls into that category.
This lightweight stuff is made using fine carbon strands set in resin and is employed to create incredibly light yet massively strong components in everything from aircraft to Formula 1 cars. But, in fact, carbonfibre and the techniques used to harness its properties have been evolving for decades and continue to do so.
McLaren Automotive last year revealed a method of forming carbonfibre components that is new to the car industry. The firm called it ‘McLaren ART’.
All of its supercars from its first production car, the McLaren MP4-12C in 2011, have been constructed around advanced carbonfibre tubs. Prior to McLaren Automotive being formed in 2010 to build production road cars, McLaren introduced lightweight carbonfibre chassis technology to Formula 1 with the MP4/1 and a carbonfibre chassis was at the core of the 1993 McLaren F1 road car.
ART (Automated Rapid Tape) is a relatively new method of applying carbonfibre to a structure and has its roots in aerospace. The advantage of using this method is that it results in even lighter, stiffer and stronger carbonfibre structures than was previously possible. That’s why it was developed for manufacturing the fuselage and wing structures of the latest airliners and fighter aircraft.
McLaren installed the ART technology at its composites technology centre in Sheffield. One of the first components to benefit from ART was the fixed plane within the active front wing of the McLaren W1. The part was 10% stiffer than using an equivalent made from the usual prepreg (carbonfibre pre-impregnated with resin).
The plan was to integrate the use of ART into the carbonfibre monocoques of McLaren cars, reducing weight even further, but McLaren won’t say whether the project has moved on since last year.
ART is what it sounds like: carbonfibre in the form of ribbon-like tape that employs a robotic process. It’s applied by moving the job in hand, which is mounted on a moving and rotating bed, rather than moving the heads depositing the tape – and that’s the difference between the way McLaren employs the technology and how it’s used in aerospace, where the job is fixed and the ‘deposition’ heads move.
The tape can be applied over a base of conventional prepreg mat but, importantly, it allows engineers more freedom to concentrate fibres in areas of high stress, such as joints or edges, and to avoid using it unnecessarily in low-stress regions. There’s less waste through fewer offcuts of conventional mat that can’t be reused, with up to 95% of the tape used ending up in the finished job.
By being more economical with the material, ART has the potential for carbonfibre to be used more often in cars.
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