Trilaminate Wheel Arch Liners (Mud Guards)

The state of the art for wheel arch liners technology today implies the use of three main product kinds.

Materials used show different characteristics in terms of weight of finished parts, mechanical, physical and acoustical properties. The aim of this paper is to provide a comparison of the main properties of the different materials used.

The activity takes in consideration a first characterization of materials in evaluation for further developments, that imply the use of a foamed PP layer as intermediate layer, with the goal of increasing the part thickness, improving its stiffness or, maintaining same mechanical and acoustic properties, reducing the part weight.