Arcimoto Pure Electric Fun Utility Vehicle Lightweighted Using Generative Design and Additive Manufacturing Capabilities

January 21, XponentialWorks, a venture, innovation and advisory company reinventing additive manufacturing, announced a project with Arcimoto, Inc.®, (NASDAQ: FUV) to design and fabricate lightweighted components for Arcimoto’s Fun Utility Vehicle® (FUV®), with the goal of reducing cost, improving performance, efficiency, and making the vehicle even more environmentally friendly. Please click here for the media kit.Test Driving Arcimoto’s Lightweighted FUV @ XponentialWorks. Image via Business Wire.

“We are very excited to work with Arcimoto to leverage our technological know-how to make this incredible vehicle even more outstanding”

If successful, the new parts may take the place of heavier, regularly manufactured parts and may enable Arcimoto’s electric vehicles to drive farther distances on a single charge, improve acceleration, and deliver better handling – all while parts costs are reduced during production. The lightweighted designs were made using artificial intelligence and computer generated design by ParaMatters.

ParaMatters’ unique technology was used to redesign and fabricate new parts with geometries that mimic natural structure, patented by nature, to add a level of performance and sustainability that is unparalleled – from energy savings to material usage and beyond.

Lightweighted parts include:

• Rear swing arm: Regular part to be lightweighted by up to 34%
• Knuckle: Regular part to be lightweighted by up to 36%
• Upper control arm: Regular part to be lightweighted by up to 52%
• Brake pedal: Regular part to be lightweighted by up to 49%

“We are very excited to work with Arcimoto to leverage our technological know-how to make this incredible vehicle even more outstanding,” said XponentialWorks founder Avi Reichental. “The entire redesign, from concept to parts, took only four weeks, further demonstrating how 3D printing technology is completely changing how we design and manufacture products.”

ParaMatters-Designed Lightweighted 3D Printed Part @ XponentialWorks. Image via Business Wire.

“We are thrilled to open Arcimoto’s ultra-efficient vehicle platform to XponentialWorks’ team of lightweighting and additive manufacturing experts,” said Arcimoto CEO Mark Frohnmayer. “Our mission to rightsize the footprint of daily mobility means a continued commitment to optimizing not just the vehicle platform architecture, but all of its constituent parts as well. The speed at which the XponentialWorks team has made meaningful weight improvements to core components of the Fun Utility Vehicle is truly impressive.”

“With the powerful combination of AI-generated designs and ultra-fast 3D printing processes, we are now able to create complex geometric structures which substantially lightweight vehicles, improve performance, lower production costs and save on battery power. We welcome this opportunity with Arcimoto to provide their drivers with the best possible in-vehicle experience,” said Reichental. “In this new age of industry 4.0 manufacturing, no one company can do it all alone. This project demonstrates the power of curating relationships and building joint innovation programs that pool together resources and expertise from complementary organizations to create practical tractable products in record time.”

 The Technology Behind the Lightweighting: Design and 3D Printing

ParaMatters’s CogniCAD software uses AI to create designs with engineers by simply entering design goals and materials parameters. The AI can explore nearly infinite design permutations based on the design concept, and provide an optimal solution to lightweight parts. CogniCAD can also automatically combine all the different parts into one homogeneous assembly instead of creating multiple parts that need to be manufactured – a time consuming activity that also leads to heavier components. Arcimoto FUV’s lightweighted parts can then be 3D printed to produce the final product.

Source: Business Wire