Toyota Goes Carbon Fiber
Published Monday, 01 November, 2010 by Blog Admin. Categories: Fleet, News.
Toyota is looking to use carbon fiber in the production of vehicle chassis. This will cut down on weight in some of their future high performance vehicles, such as the possible FT-86 concept. Here's more from the official press release:
Toray Industries Inc. (Tokyo, Japan) announced that it will start supplying Toyota Motor Corp. (TMC) and Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd. (FHI) with carbon fiber for car bodies later this year-the first use of carbon fiber for auto bodies mass-produced in Japan.
Toyota reportedly will use carbon fiber for the hood and roof of the Lexus LFA, a luxury sports car to be produced starting in December. Fuji Heavy will sell roofs made from carbon fiber as an optional item for its standard-class sports car.
Such uses of carbon fiber became possible as a result of Toray's new production technology, which halves costs for dies. Carbon fiber costs are more than 20 times greater than those of steel, but the technology is expected to narrow the gap to about five times.
Toray says the rise of steel prices has also helped narrow the cost difference. And more use of carbon fiber in car bodies would increase its production, likely to further reduce costs. Greater use of carbon fiber in car bodies is expected to create 30,000 tons worth of demand per year-equivalent to all the demand for carbon fiber at present.
Check out the latest in new Toyota technology now at Toyota of Wallingford.
[SOURCE] http://www.compositesworld.com/news/toray-to-supply-toyota-with-carbon-fiber-for-car-bodies
Toray Industries Inc. (Tokyo, Japan) announced that it will start supplying Toyota Motor Corp. (TMC) and Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd. (FHI) with carbon fiber for car bodies later this year-the first use of carbon fiber for auto bodies mass-produced in Japan.
Toyota reportedly will use carbon fiber for the hood and roof of the Lexus LFA, a luxury sports car to be produced starting in December. Fuji Heavy will sell roofs made from carbon fiber as an optional item for its standard-class sports car.
Such uses of carbon fiber became possible as a result of Toray's new production technology, which halves costs for dies. Carbon fiber costs are more than 20 times greater than those of steel, but the technology is expected to narrow the gap to about five times.
Toray says the rise of steel prices has also helped narrow the cost difference. And more use of carbon fiber in car bodies would increase its production, likely to further reduce costs. Greater use of carbon fiber in car bodies is expected to create 30,000 tons worth of demand per year-equivalent to all the demand for carbon fiber at present.
Check out the latest in new Toyota technology now at Toyota of Wallingford.
[SOURCE] http://www.compositesworld.com/news/toray-to-supply-toyota-with-carbon-fiber-for-car-bodies