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US 11,712,948 B2Granted
High strength aluminum alloy door beam
AssigneeHonda Motor Co., Ltd.
InventorEric J. Boettcher
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A vehicle door beam and related methods of making door beams include a flat-rolled aluminum alloy sheet, where two edges of the sheet that are transverse to the roll direction of the sheet are brought together to form a tube. The two edges are friction stir welded together to form a butt joint along a length of the tube. The tube is arranged, along with other optional components, as a side-impact door beam in a vehicle door, such that the butt joint is facing away from an expected impact direction of the vehicle door.
Claims9
A method for making a tube comprising:
- providing a flat-rolled aluminum alloy sheet having a roll direction;
- bringing together two edges of the sheet that are transverse to the roll direction to thereby form a butt seam;
- friction stir welding the butt seam to form the tube;
- and
- removing a portion of the sheet before friction stir welding to form an aperture extending through a thickness of the sheet and having an opening at an end of the tube.
2 more elements
A method of producing a door beam comprising:
- providing a sheet of flat-rolled aluminum alloy, the sheet having a leading edge, an opposite trailing edge, and a roll direction extending from the leading edge to the trailing edge;
- friction stir welding the leading edge to the trailing edge at a butt joint to form a tube of the flat-rolled aluminum alloy;
- removing a portion of the sheet before friction stir welding to form an aperture extending through a thickness of the sheet and having an opening at an end of the tube;
- and
- securing mounting brackets to the tube, the mounting brackets being securable to a vehicle door.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.