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The fundamentals of multi-leaf spring design as determined through beam theory offers a general perspective on how finite element analysis works. Additionally, the fundamentals of combining dissimilar materials require a basic knowledge of how the combined equivalent modulus affects the overall stiffness characteristics of multi-leaf design. By capturing these basic fundamentals into finite element modeling, an analysis of a steel-composite multi-leaf contact model relative to an idealized steel-composite multi-leaf model shows the importance of contact modeling. The results demonstrate the important differences between an idealized non-contact model relative to a complete contact model.

Although not completely understood, rotor distortion due to bolt-up is an issue commonly found in conventional brake rotor design. In this paper, bolt-up is addressed by utilizing optimization and contact analysis methods. These methods give greater insight to the contributing factors that influence bolt-up distortion. In particular, the optimization method defines the approximate geometric shape required for a brake rotor based on optimizing one or more variables. By utilizing the non-linear contact analysis method, the results from the optimization analysis are validated. In general, the results show that bolt-up distortion is not significantly affected by changing design features, variables or combinations of design features and variables. However, significant improvement in bolt-up distortion is noticed when changes are made to the brake rotor and the wheel bearing hub.