Quality Assurance for Battery Trays
Component reliability through inspection and quality data
Holistic inspection process promotes battery tray quality
Ensuring proper formation and integration
As a battery receptacle fully integrated into the body of an electric vehicle, the battery tray must be mechanically stable and fit seamlessly into its surroundings. Featuring a complex aluminum weld design, it houses all battery cells, connectors, control units, and the battery packs that contain numerous battery modules.
The integrity of the battery tray and its structure must be inspected at multiple intervals during production to ensure quality and safety. This involves a variety of methods such as full-field inspection and a range of ZEISS technologies including CMMs and X-ray systems.
ZEISS solutions at every step
Blue Line for battery tray quality
Full-field geometry acquisition with ZEISS
ZEISS optical measuring machines enable full-field measurement of the battery tray featuring high-precision fringe projection. They digitize the part from different viewing directions with high speed, accuracy, and resolution. The sensors generate entirely correlation-free and traceable measuring data.Optical measurement with 3D measuring machine
Users obtain millions of full-field distributed 3D coordinates, which can be compared with the CAD model to detect deviations and identify defects such as deformations. The software uses CAD data and inspection plans for fully automated creation of the sensor positions and robot paths required for acquisition.
Digital twin for process and quality control
The result of the measurement is a geometrical digital twin that shows the real geometry of the battery tray. Process-related inspection features can be extracted from the 3D point cloud and evaluated in a trend analysis: Based on full-field measurements, this enables early detection of changes in the production process.
Deviations between digital twin and CAD data
During problem analysis in ZEISS INSPECT, the surface deviations are color-coded in the 3D point cloud to help achieve the desired nominal CAD geometry. GD&T functions enable calculation of the flatness or surface profile of sealing surfaces or individual battery compartments – and it is also easy to capture the height and position of the sealing bead.
Digital assembly
The digital assembly helps assess interaction between battery modules and the battery tray, enables simulation and optimization of assembly situations, and provides detail on gap size changes caused by thermal deformation of modules. Module-to-tray surface deviations are used to calculate the heat-conducting paste volume for individual battery compartments.