INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PRECISION ENGINEERING AND MANUFACTURING Vol. 15, No. 8, pp. 1609-1613

AUGUST 2014 / 1609

DOI: 10.1007/s12541-014-0510-y

Optimal Strength Design of Composite Bicycle Wheels Hyoung-Taek Hong1, Heoung-Jae Chun1,#, and Heung-Soap Choi2 1 School of Mechanical Engineering, Yonsei University, 50, Yonsei-ro, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, South Korea, 120-749 2 Department of Mechanical and Design Engineering, Hongik University, 2639, Sejong-ro, Jochiwon-eup, Sejong, South Korea, 339-701 # Corresponding Author / E-mail: [email protected], TEL: +82-2-2123-4827, FAX: +82-2-362-2736 KEYWORDS: Composite material, Bicycle wheel, Stacking sequence, Optimization

A high specific strength and specific stiffness are essential in high-performance bicycle wheel design. However, it is challenging for traditional materials to satisfy these trends, although advanced composite materials can be selected to simultaneously satisfy those requirements. This paper presents ply stacking sequence optimization for a composite bicycle wheel subjected to standard loading cases. In the design of a high performance composite bicycle wheel, the stacking sequence of composite plies in the wheel is an important parameter. The objective function for the optimization is to minimize the Tsai-Wu failure index. For optimal design, finite element analysis is conducted for a composite rim. Discrete ply-angle stacking sequence optimization was used for the development of a composite bicycle frame. The amount of change in the discrete ply orientation was 15°, and the limits of design variables were -180°