Since 2009, PJS have been making wind deflector assemblies for numerous prestige vehicles including:
Range Rover, Range Rover Sport, Jaguar XJ and, more recently, Maserati Levante.
With the new generation of vehicles, such as Land Rover’s new Discovery, a new design brief required the parts to be lighter, with a smaller overall part count.
Old Design
18 separate parts
340g total weight
To achieve their objectives, our customer needed to replace metal parts with plastic ones and review the Designs For Assembly.
New Design
11 separate parts (39% less)
286g total weight (16% less)
Solution
With our toolmaking partners in the far east, and experts within Europe, we set about using the latest CAE tools. We constructed a complete solution in the virtual world, with all water ways in place, then predicted how the part would react and perform once it was demoulded. We suggested changes in the design of the part, such as more or less ribs, and then accurately predicted their effects.
Result
Total assembly cost reduced by 28%