The Use of Fiber Reinforced Plastics in a Manifold for Cartridge Valves

The concept of the work presented starts from the fact that since years, the fluid power industry is basing its performance on metallic materials and components, reaching a high level of performance. Nevertheless, some constraints hinder further development in terms of high weight of stainless steel components, or limit in the use of environmentally friendly operating fluids for the oxidation of metals. The use of lighter material (Fiber Reinforced Plastics - FRP) in fluid power applications could perform a substantial development of the energy efficiency tanks to weight reduction and to optimization of fluid-dynamic of hydraulic circuit components, and consequently, a reduction in environment emission caused by off-road machine. In the paper presented here the authors handle the numerical simulation of a fluid power manifold for a cartridge valve. Starting from the numeric analysis of the actual (metallic) part, the authors have performed a numerical re-design, using fiber reinforced plastics as base material, with the aim of having the same metallic manifold's strain. The results are encouraging and show the limits and the advantages connected to the FRP use in fluid power components.