Optimization study of a parametric vehicle bumper subsystem under multiple load cases using LMS Virtual.Lab and OPTIMUS

This paper deals with the design and optimization of a vehicle bumper subsystem, which is a key scenario for vehicle component design. More than ever before, the automotive industry operates inhighly competitive environment. Manufacturers must deal with competitive pressure and with conflicting demands from customers and regulatory bodies regarding the vehicle functional performance and the environmental and societal impact. This, in addition to the quick-time-to-market, forces them to develop products of increasing quality in even shorter time. As a result, bumper suppliers are under pressure to increasingly limit the weight, while meeting all relevant design targets for crashworthiness and safety. To succeed in such a challenging environment, manufacturers must make upfront decisions based on multi-attribute simulations directly performed on a parametric CAD. LMS Virtual.Lab offers an integrated platform to design engineers who are challenged with multi- attribute design of mechanical structures. For the vehicle bumper subsystem of interest, engineers can start from the CAD design, define a generic assembly model, define multi-attribute simulation models and meshes, as well as multiple analysis cases. The entire process is fully associative, enabling automated iteration of design and model changes, which is key towards an efficient optimization process with OPTIMUS. The structural bumper model is created, parameterizing its geometric and sectional properties. A Design of Experiments (DOE) strategy is adopted to efficiently identify the most important design parameters. Subsequently, an optimization is performed on small-sized Response Surface Models (RSM), in order to minimize the vehicle bumper weight, while meeting all design targets.