Self-Piercing Rivets

Government legislation to lower emissions by the automotive industry means that cars have to be lighter. Many companies including Jaguar, BMW and Audi now use aluminium to form the structure of their cars.  Self Piercing Rivets (SPR) are used to robotically fasten these aluminium panels together. You will learn how these specialised SPR's work, which dimensions control the joint strength and the hand calculations necessary to structurally design joints formed by SPR.

To help reduce emissions and fuel consumption the automotive industry relies heavily upon constructing lightweight aluminium vehicle body structures using self-piercing rivets (SPRs). All major car manufacturing companies (Jaguar, Audi, Bentley, etc...) now use SPRs as fasteners in their aluminium cars. It is essential that a minimum number of SPRs are used to achieve cost viability as each SPR has its own dedicated robot. Engineering with SPRs involves a multi-disciplinary approach with engineers that includes elements such as: CAD operation, stressing, weight reduction, costing and testing.

This SPR course provides a detailed presentation with notes and formulas relating to the practical design and strength analysis of Lap and T-Peel joints formed with SPRs and SPRs combined with adhesive bond. Strength Mode and Failure Mode modelling allows for product designs that maximise the structural reliability whilst minimising the weight and associated cost. The student needs no prior knowledge of SPRs as the course pragmatically introduces all the necessary aspects of SPR joint design and stress analysis. 

The following content will be covered:

• SPR History & SPR Fastening Process
• Advantages & Applications of SPRs
• SPR Lap Joint Strengths, SPR Axial Load & Failure Modes 
• SPR T-Peel  Joint Strengths, SPR Axial Load & Failure Modes 
• SPR for ACM2 Analysis
• Hybrid SPRs
• SPRs combined with Adhesive Lap Joint
• SPRs combined with Adhesive T-Peel Joint
• Workshop with sample calculations in MathCad & JSAMs 

 This course comes with a free book: The Design and Stress Analysis of Self-Piercing Rivet Joints.