The Role of the Chemist in Automotive Design

Today’s engineering applications require material knowledge beyond that typically possessed by mechanical engineers involved with automotive design. This book explains how chemists are taking on design responsibilities in the automotive industry and explores the critical role that polymers play in the design process. In addition to making automobiles lighter, polymers also make them more cost effective and environmentally friendly. Furthermore, polymer films and nanomaterials are key to fuel cells, foams, and filtration systems under the hood. With over 20 years of vehicle design and laboratory experience, the author explores this shift and helps define a new role and new requirements for those interested in automotive design.

From the development of polymers that make cars lighter to fuels that make them run cleaner, the chemist’s role in the automotive industry has evolved to be one that is more outside the laboratory than in it. Drawing on the author’s 20 years of experience in vehicle design and laboratory experience, The Role of the Chemist in Automotive Design elucidates how the skills of chemists are put to use in the automotive industry and their effect on all phases of design.

A glance through the table of contents provides an overview of the issues commonly encountered by chemists in the automotive industry. The author discusses fuels cells, lithium ion batteries, carbon nanotubes, and nickel metal hydride technology, all of which require the technical knowledge of a chemist but cross the lines of various disciplines. He also covers future technology including items such as battery technology, fuel cell membranes, and environmentally friendly plastics such as nylons that use castor oil as a primary component. The book examines environmental concerns such as CARB legislation and how the industry plans to deal with the new legislation with strategies such as Ozone Reduction Catalyst.

The increasing technological, environmental, and economic issues facing the auto industry underscores the need for a basic reference that covers technologies that can be used to make vehicle more fuel efficient, environmentally friendly, and cost efficient. Exploring the expanding role chemists will play in future automotive design and technology, this book delineates the areas and technologies that require the technical knowledge of a chemist but that cross the lines of many disciplines.