Coats joins GM-led U.S. DOE project to develop composite EV battery enclosures

Industrial thread company Coats (Uxbridge, U.K.) announced July 15 that it has joined a team, led by automaker General Motors LLC (GM, Detroit, Mich., U.S.), to developed a tailored fiber-reinforced composites solution for volume manufacturing of structural battery enclosures in electric vehicles (EV), under U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) cooperative agreement DE-EE0009204.

Coats is providing expert knowledge and innovation in tailored fiber-reinforced composites technology to help develop lightweight, high-performance and cost-effective structural battery enclosures.

The collaboration builds on previous work with GM in developing lightwight composite floor reinforcement structures. Coats says it plans to propose its Lattice and Lattice Conductive technologies for the design and manufacture of ultra-light composite material products. Lattice is an optimized, cointinuous fiber laying technique that creates preforms with zero waste, and was demonstrated on a complex floor reinforcement component. Lattice Conductive enables integration of conductive paths and electronic circuitry in molded composite components. Coats uses proprietary computer aided engineering (CAE) tools to create a 2D Lattice continuous fiber preform that can be fabricated into a 3D preform mold. 

According to Coats, its Lattice technology reduces cost by generating zero-waste preforms and placing fibers only where needed, and by reducing the processing steps required to fabricate a 3D preform for molding by 50%.

The development will be resourced from the Coats Innovation Hub at its Sevier site in North Carolina, U.S. The project is due to run until December 2023.

Ronan Cox, president, Performance Materials at Coats, says, “This is an exciting opportunity to innovate with a group of companies led by a global automotive leader to develop a composites solution at scale. Lighter, stronger and cost-effective composites solutions form part of the journey towards a zero-emissions future in automotive. It is excellent recognition of our expertise and also means Coats is contributing towards a more sustainable future for the industry.”

Dr Venkat Aitharaju, staff research, GM Research and Development, says, “Coats Lattice Preform technology is a system that shows promise and may help make a positive business case for lightweight solutions.”