NEW WIRING for VEHICLES

Project Information

NEWIR

Grant agreement ID: 717485

DOI

10.3030/717485

Project closed

EC signature date 1 March 2016

Start date 1 March 2016

End date 30 June 2016

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Smart, Green And Integrated Transport

Total cost

€ 71 429,00

EU contribution

€ 50 000,00

Coordinated by

OTOMEC SRL
Italy

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - NEWIR (NEW WIRING for VEHICLES)

Reporting period: 2016-03-01 to 2016-06-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

One of the most important objectives of the European automotive industry is to reduce the vehicles’ weight in order to lower the consumptions and consequently the environmental impact. To this end one of the main strategic drivers is to lighten as much as possible every kind of car component, included the electrical wiring.
The goal of our project is to address this issue, developing an integrated plant that will electro-plate aluminium wire with copper and normalise it. These new cables will weigh about half as much as the equivalent copper cables and will have an approximately 40% lower production cost.

The replacement of all electric copper wires in a mid-sized car with galvanic plated aluminum electric wires can lead to a weight reduction of 85 Kg, which brings, for this application only, to an average reduction of 115Kg in CO2 emission.

All activities carried out in the feasibility have demonstrated the validity of the business idea, both from the technological and the economic points of view.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

The Pilot Trials have demonstrated that electro plating with copper a pure aluminium wire we obtain a product with resistivity, conductivity and mechanical properties suitable for electric applications in the automotive industry; it was proved that the thermal treatment, necessary to draw and twist the wire, is not influencing the conductivity.

No high risks able to harm the development of our project have been identified; in any case potential risks which can affect the advancement of the project have been discussed, with their consequences and probability they could happen. It has been defined a list of risk-mitigation measures.

The business planning has allowed to define with precision all the economic elements involved in the project and the related investment needs; the projections in terms of revenues and net-profit developed in the business plan are positive, therefore they encourage us to continue the project.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

Having demonstrated the validity of our idea, if we will reach our market goal, from the fifth year of project completion more than 1% in weight of the copper used to produce cables for the transport sector in Europe can be replaced by aluminium, so that European copper cable manufacturers will save tens of tons of copper per year with a significant economic advantage. Even more important, they will able to produce a wire lighter and cheaper than an equivalent copper cable, therefore very attractive for the car producers.

Laboratory Test Plant