Authored By:
O. Rusanen, T. Heikkilä, P. Korhonen, M. Kärnä, P. Niskala
TactoTek (Finland)
T. Beljah, C. Cuvillier
Faurecia (France)
Summary
This paper presents results from a joined R&D project between two companies; Automotive Tier-1 and Technology Provider of structural electronics. Key benefits of structural electronics are 3-dimensional shapes, reduced thickness and weight as well as simplified assembly. The purpose of this project has been to evaluate structural electronics for automotive interior use. The car interior application is back-seat-control-panel and the structural electronics solution reduces thickness by 70 % and weight by 50 %. The back-seat-control-panel has been subjected to severe testing based on automotive OEM requirements. Environmental loads have been changing of temperature, combination of high humidity and changing of temperature as well as combination of UV-light and high temperature. None of the components failed during reliability testing.
Conclusions
Key benefits of structural electronics are 3-dimensional shapes, reduced thickness and weight as well as simplified assembly. For the back-seat-control panel, the structural electronics solution reduces thickness by 70 % and weight by 50 %.
This control-panel has been subjected to severe reliability testing based on automotive OEM requirements. Environmental loads have been changing of temperature, combination of high humidity and changing of temperature as well as combination of UV-light and high temperature. None of the components failed during reliability testing. Studies done by LED and injection molding suppliers did not show any adverse effects on LEDs or injection molding resin.
Initially Published in the SMTA Proceedings
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