F
isker Automotive Inc., Anaheim, Calif., knew a die
casting was in its future when it embarked on a journey to create a luxury, hybrid sports car. What was unknown: who would the diecaster be? T e complexity of the main transmission housing
brought in its share of “no-quotes” for the project but caught the interest of Mercury Marine, Fond du Lac, Wis. “It was such a diffi cult, thick-walled, high pressure die
casting, and that’s what sparked our interest,” said Todd Olson, account manager with Mercury Marine. From there, Mercury Marine embarked on a journey of its own: converting the
component to a die casting and working through design plans to make the transmission housing for Fisker’s Karma a reality.
Finding Mercury Marine “We came into play before they even had their fi rst production part,”
Olson said. “T ey were working on product design and validation, but they
knew they wanted to go diecast.” With little luck fi nding a supplier
for the transmission part initially, Fisker contacted Tremec, Queretaro, Mexico, the company that completes transmission assembly, who then con- tacted its machining house, Pioneer Products, Racine, Wis. “We have never done anything for
Pioneer Products previously, but they know about us,” Olson said. “T ey have toured our facility in Fond du Lac in the past and understand our capability on diffi cult parts.” Pioneer Products approached
Mercury Marine with Fisker’s transmission housing plans. “T ey came to us and said a lot of
people are no-quoting, but we think you can do it,” Olson said. “We looked at it and said we would be willing to take a try, so we concepted our tooling plan and quoted it.”
It also helped that the company
was no stranger to converting to die castings, having previously worked through many conversions. Typically, Mercury Marine stays
away from automotive castings, but this case was diff erent. “We embrace the opportunity to
be on the ground fl oor with a green initiative program,” Olson said. “We are all about green initiatives at Mer- cury. In fact, we consider our smelting operation a green initiative because we are using mostly recycled product for our special alloys we smelt.” T e Karma was Fisker’s fi rst en-
The Karma’s main transmission housing weighs in at 55 lbs. and shows off design and HPDC casting capabilities.
TIPS FOR TRANSITIONING PROCESSES Buyers and designers looking to convert a component
to HPDC should be open to part changes for castability, including the ability to extract the part from the tool, based on die and slide pulls for parting lines and fl ow simulation data that is part of the design process. Fea- tures like undercuts cannot be included in the component, or it will not come out of the die as one piece. Mercury Marine considered multiple die orientations and performed
34 | METAL CASTING DESIGN & PURCHASING | Nov/Dec 2012
deavor in the automotive market. It’s a plug-in, hybrid luxury sports sedan, fi rst unveiled in 2008 at the North American International Auto Show held in Detroit. T ough the company had plans to have it in production in
simulations to ensure its gating designs were on track to properly fi ll the die. In addition, there may be an opportu- nity to reduce wall thickness or casting features that are currently machined in the original design, all in an effort to reduce cost and enhance the quality of the part. Take time to meet with your diecaster throughout the vari- ous stages of the casting process and be sure the design requirements are understood on both sides, up front.
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