Shock Tower
Development & Production
Shock towers are perfect examples for substituting multiple assembled parts: Integrating all functions into one single cast solution reduce weight, time and assembly steps. Working in close collaboration with the customer BMW, GF takes care of industrialization and serial production of the die casting component as soon as the final geometry of the shock tower is designed to enable its production in the die casting process. With the in-house value chain, GF Casting Solutions is meeting the rise in demand increasingly supplying components that are ready to mount. Furthermore, these shock towers and their prior generation are perfect examples for GF’s global production network – with a serial shock tower industrial-ized in Austria for the European market being then transferred to the foundry in China for the Asian market.
Challenges & Special Features
Being part of the chassis, this lightweight shock tower needs to absorb all the load in a crash situation. Furthermore, its coating needs to fulfill special quality requirements. GF ensures for the entire serial production that high requirements, be it the profile tolerances, mechanical properties and surface requirements, are all met.
“The great lightweight potential of shock towers is becoming more relevant to other parts of the BIW (Body-in-White) structure, too. It works for the Front Shock Tower but also for other structure parts – which we will see more and more in the future.”
Steffen Dekoj
Head R&D Asia
Highlights
- High functional integration
- Weight reduction due to substitution of single parts
- Lightweight design in aluminum HPDC for passenger cars in the luxury class
Features
| Customer | BMW |
| Vehicle | 7 Series/5 Series GT |
| Process | Aluminum high-pressure die-casting |
| Material | AlSi10MnMg |
| Weight | 4.5 kg |
| Value Chain | Casting, punching, heat treatment, machining, laser-cutting, e-coating |
