Potholes can be killer. You do your best to avoid them, but sometimes sinking a front tire into a broken asphalt chasm in unavoidable and you wince in anticipation of the impact to your tire and suspension. Audi is looking to improve that suspension using a new material to replace the dated technology of the all-steel spring.
Steel has classic associations in America, but Audi is not an American company. Its researchers and technicians have come up with a polymer composite designed to be incredibly lightweight, resilient to several thousand pounds of weight, impervious to corrosion, and unsusceptible to chemicals that collect on the underside of a vehicle. Those last two points—corrosion and chemical deterioration—are an issue for steel. By using a laboratory-produced spring, your Audi will weigh less and have an even more responsive sense of handling and ride quality.
To be clear, the spring we’re talking about is the coil located at every tire in just about every car in America. The basic steel spring is a device that has eluded innovation or improvement for decades. This represents the perfect opportunity for Audi to introduce a superior attribute that no automaker is matching.
The most surprising aspect of Audi’s polymer spring is the material used to strengthen it: glass. Although it sounds unlikely, glass fibers are interwoven at a near microscopic level, and then injected with epoxy resin. The process is then repeated with more fibers at a 45 degree angle, then the whole spring is heat-cured at 212 degrees Fahrenheit. Audi’s GFRP springs are much thicker than the steel they replace. However, they weigh less and are coiled much more tightly.
Audi is planning to introduce its exclusive GFRP suspension coils in production models by the fall of this year. Given that the new coils take far less energy to produce than steel, the environmental impact of their manufacture will be far better for the earth as well. New Audis will weigh less, have a more stable feel, and will handle better. We look forward to test-driving them soon and are proud to see Audi raising the bar for innovative features.