Reliability-Based Multidisciplinary Design Optimization of a Full Vehicle System

Abstract

This paper focuses on the methodology development and application of reliability-based multidisciplinary design optimization to vehicle crashworthiness under the constraints of full frontal impact, roof crush, side impact, 50% frontal offset impact, and other potential safety performance measurement. Reliability-based multidisciplinary design optimization provides an analytic and systematic tool for considering uncertainty in product development process. It is often infeasible due to the lack of computational resources, simulation capabilities, and efficient optimization methodologies, as reliability analysis itself is a design optimization problem that requires many function evaluations. This paper investigates two optimization methodologies and demonstrates them by applying to a full vehicle design of multiple impact modes with uncertainties taken into consideration.