Automotive Engineering - February 2023 - 9

TECHNOLOGY REPORT
MANUFACTURING
A Divergent approach to vehicle development and production
Among the most intriguing vehicles on
display at the 2022 Pebble Beach
Concours D' Elegance was a pair developed
by an obscure brand, Czinger
Vehicles, and its parent company,
Divergent Technologies.
The 21C V Max and Hyper GT that
impressed the concours audience showcase
Divergent Technologies' breadth of
capabilities in design, engineering and
production - a systems approach that is
predicated on no specific designed
tooling for components or assembly.
This has led to the Waterloo, Ontario,
Canada-based company doing everything
from developing its own topology-optimization
software, called " Bi-directional
Evolutionary Structural Optimization, " to
working with 3D-printer company SLM
Solutions to develop a high-throughput
additive manufacturing system, to developing
many of the metal powders that
are used to build parts. It also has created
a robot-based automated assembly system
and formulates the adhesives that
are used for bonding.
Full development
" We spent a number of years engineering
the joint architecture, " of the two
show vehicles, said Mike Kenworthy,
Divergent's CTO, in an interview with
SAE Media. He said about 350 parts per
vehicle were created using additive
manufacturing (AM, or 3D printing). The
system being used is the SLM NXG XII
60. It employs 12 1,000-kW lasers to
produce parts at a rate that is 10 to 20
times faster than most service bureaus
using the latest four-laser systems,
Kenworthy said.
Kevin Czinger, founder and CEO of
the company bearing his name as well
as of Divergent Technologies, worked
with SLM personnel to develop the machine.
" On average, depending on build
density and packing, we
are printing around a kilogram
to a kilogramand-a-half
[of components]
per hour, " he noted.
The whole process is
called the Divergent
Adaptive Production
System (DAPS). Although
production of the first
Czinger vehicle, the 21C
planned for launch in
2023, is limited to a total
build of 80 units,
Kenworthy said that the
DAPS is predicated on
higher volumes.
This thinking led to the
The chassis of Divergent's 21C, produced using
aluminum alloy components that are 3D-printed then
adhesive-bonded.
AUTOMOTIVE ENGINEERING
development of the adhesives
that are used as
the primary joining
method. (The vehicle
uses a limited number of
The Czinger
Hyper GT is
a four-place
vehicle that will
be structurally
based on AM
and showcases
the flexibility
of Divergent's
production
system.
mechanical fasteners.) Two types of
adhesive are employed: UV-cured and
heat-cured. The UV-cured adhesive is
particularly important: during assembly
it acts as a tack weld that holds the
primarily aluminum parts (made from
AL alloys that Divergent developed to
have specific characteristics, e.g.,
crash-energy management) together
during build in the robotic cell.
Kenworthy said the company tested
" literally hundreds of adhesives on the
market " and determined that none of
them would meet the requirement that
would provide what he calls " automotive-relevant
cycle times and rates. " The
best UV-curing adhesive they found
had a curing time of approximately 40
sec. The adhesive Divergent developed
cures in about 3 sec. and, Kenworthy
explained, can deal with the temperatures
used when the primary structural
adhesive is cured.
While most automotive OEMs currently
are using AM for trim pieces, assembly
jigs or small numbers of production
parts, Kenworthy says
Divergent is working toward hundreds
of thousands of vehicle structure programs.
In addition to Czinger, Divergent
operates as a Tier One supplier. It currently
has " around 20 active programs "
with major OEMs, Kenworthy explained.
Electric vehicles? " There is a massive
opportunity for additive manufacturing, "
he answered. " We can leverage it
to reduce weight and improve the performance
of those structures. "
Steven Macaulay
February 2023 9
BOTH IMAGES: DIVERGENT TECHNOLOGIES
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