New material trend (Giga steel) comes to E-mobility market
ILLIES KOREA provides and introduces Giga steel roll forming machine to Sungwoo, Korea
Since 2014 the automotive industry has been focusing on light-weight solutions and several kinds of different materials have been tested.
In order to meet the request for weight reduction of the parts while keeping stable stiffness in case of an accident the automotive industry, especially in regards to E-mobility, has focused on Giga steel (UHSS) as an alternative to currently used materials. Giga steel can be used for bumpers and crash boxes, for conventional automotive and E-mobility and for the main frame of battery cases as protection in case of an accident.
European OEMs and big U.S players have started using Giga steel for EV battery cases and EV body structure parts, however compared to processing regular steel (tensile strength: 400 ~ 800 Mpa), processing Giga steel (tensile strength: 1.8 Gpa) is more challenging.
ILLIES KOREA (KIECO) customer Sungwoo, first-tier supplier for Hyundai motors with branches & sales offices as well as many further automotive customers in Europe, America and Asia, producing mostly bumper rail, body frame and chassis parts, started developing a solution for processing Giga steel. Due to highest tensile strength, not only were the forming and shaping processes difficult to achieve, but also the forming result was not stable and constant with local solutions. Sungwoo requested ILLIES KOREA to find a European machine builder who is an expert in this field.
After thorough research KIECO finally selected and introduced Giga steel roll forming specialist Dreistern GmbH & Co. KG from Germany. Dreistern has several references regarding Giga steel roll forming lines in Europe, Central & North America as well as in Asia. They are well known for highest machine availability, innovative process integration such as Laser welding, for customized turn-key solutions and highest outputs – depending on the application, up to 200 meters/min!
Dreistern’s technology convinced Sungwoo and they placed an order for a roll forming system for their Mexican factory in order to deliver parts directly to GM’s Detroit factory. Sungwoo furthermore expects that this technology could also be adapted by Asia automotive and E-mobility OEMs in near future.
