The Design of a Composite Motorcycle Cargo Trailer

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Date
2014-12-01
Authors
Toews, Patrick
Oughton, Greg
Howell, Brett
Paulic, Nikola
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The primary objective of this project, provided to us by our client, Cormer Group Industries, was to design a high-end cargo trailer for towing behind a motorcycle. For this trailer, the use of composite material was to be maximized in the design, with a minimum of having a carbon fiber outer shell. The team was required to provide Cormer with full, detailed drawings of all trailer components, along with a complete manufacturing plan for the prototype. The finished product will be priced for the higher end customer, and therefore a high level of quality needs was pursued throughout all aspects of the design process. We began our design process with brainstorming, and developed the body design using a multi-tiered concept selection process using weighted needs from both the client and our own internal research. We refined our final design by integrating the most desirable features from our 3 highest ranked concepts. In order to reduce the complexity and cost of manufacturing, we have outsourced components for the trailer whenever in-house fabrication would be impractical or too complex. In addition, we performed extensive research to make selections of all outsourced components and materials used in our design. This ensured that the final design fully met all of the customer needs. Our final design has a dry weight of 153.9 lbs. This makes on average one of the lighter trailers of this type available, but features the best in-class interior cargo volume of 28.4 ft3. This easily meets the client’s requirement that the trailer be capable of carrying 2 golf bags or two large suitcases. The final cost for a single trailer, including materials, manufacturing and assembly, was determined to be$5,600 with a sales price of $6,750.With regards to the manufacturing and assembly, we have created full engineering drawings for all parts and assemblies in our design, as requested by Cormer. This serves as a detailed record of our design, as well as instructions for manufacturing our design. These drawings are detailed down to the component level for the parts made in house. The assembly drawings make reference their respective part […]
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