Rivian officials explained the three-year process they undertook to research, develop, validate, and publish new repair procedures during an OEM Collision Repair Technology Summit at the 2024 SEMA Show in Las Vegas.

SCRS promoted the session as an inside look into the value of OEM repair information and how procedure development and testing play a critical role in safe and proper repairs.

Kelly Logan, Rivian service and collision repair programs director, said it is typical for startups to design an “amazing car” and then bring in a service department after the fact.

Rivian’s vehicle is unique because it is an electric vehicle (EV) with a full frame, Logan said.

“I identified early on that we needed to have a way to fix this frame,” Logan said.

The frame is important not only for safety but also for protecting the battery pack, he said. The team had to find a way to create localized repairs to lower the cost of ownership for customers.

“We want our vehicles repaired,” Logan said. “We want our customers to remain in their vehicles after accidents.”

Logan said he expected the project to take about a year. He didn’t realize it would take three years.

The Rivian team went through extensive steps to create repair operations for the front and rear frames, according to Dan Black, Rivian Service Engineering Collision senior manager.

Black said his team identified an area on the skateboard behind the end plate and the front that could not be repaired. He said the area was where a relatively lower-speed incident could cause damage.

If the area was damaged, he said it required an entire skateboard replacement.

“Our skateboard requires 72 fasteners to be removed from the vehicle to separate from the top,” Black said. “So the process is relatively intensive. It’s not impossible. It’s not that it’s difficult, it just takes time. We want to avoid that when we can, particularly for more common instances.”

The front zone and the rear zone of the vehicle are primary areas that need options for repairability, he said.

A seam does not exist on the front rail, Black said.

“We had to create the seam, essentially, which takes a lot more effort because it was never intended to be sectioned in that location,” Black said. “We had to find a common ground with engineering to execute a solution in that space.”

Black said the team had to focus on how to create repairability while also achieving safety and quality.

“We want to ensure it’s easy to execute using current tooling processes you are familiar with and materials you are familiar with so that you can get greater volume on these processes from your technicians,” Black said.

Rivian ultimately designed six repair process iterations before they agreed one could meet all of the objectives. The first iteration included a rivet-bonded application using structural adhesive, Black said.

“Things began to load in areas in which they were never intended to load in that way,” Black said. “We quickly determined that the first iteration was not feasible.”

A second iteration also included rivet bonding with some modifications.

“We still found ourselves at a deficit from a performance perspective,” Black said. “We had to move forward to the third iteration where we begin to now cross over into welding.”

Black said Rivian doesn’t allow welding on its ultra-high-strength steels.

“It can be quickly altered by welding and it needs to be done in a very intricate, delicate process if executed,” Black said.

After receiving approval that an exception could be provided for the area, the team then had to look at what was feasible, he said.

The rear rail design already had a joint, Black said. It was easier because it gave the team a place to start with. However, the first iteration also began with rivets and evolved to welding.

“If we can meet the target with adhesive and rivets only, we’ll take it every day,” Black said. “But if it’s not feasible from a strength perspective, we can’t move forward with it. That’s a lot of things that we learned going through those design iterations. It just wasn’t feasible to move forward with rivet bonding application.”

David Sosa, Rivian collision research and development workshop manager, said he has a background as a collision repair technician.

“I do remember looking at procedures and saying, ‘Who came up with this? Why is it this way? Why isn’t there better ways? Why hasn’t the OEM thought of this other idea?’ Well, in most cases, we probably have,” Sosa said. “It just wouldn’t work for one reason or the other. But we really do spend a lot of time in this area trying to come up with every possible solution to this.”

Logan said the team would often develop something in their Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) program, to find out later it wouldn’t be feasible. He said it would look good in a virtual environment but they would later find out a rivet gun or welder wouldn’t fit into a space.

How a repair impacts a load path is also important, Black said.

“Even though we are replacing one rail, we have to ensure it still goes one-to-one with what’s adjacent to it,” Black said.

Black said the team went back and forth between virtual and physical testing with each iteration. This included testing mini coupons in simulations to see how well welds performed, he said.

“You want steel to stretch and move because if it doesn’t, the weld just fails,” Black said.

Frame rail assemblies were also built from samples and free-dropped 50-60 feet to see how the rail responded, he said. He said the load was tested with OEM and repair samples.

“What you are evaluating is all the crumple zones, ensuring it’s loading in the same way,” Black said. “Left to right, you’re getting all the same energy displacement. That is hypercritical. That allows us to ensure that we’re going to perform to the same standard which the vehicle was originally designed to do. So we get left to right performance with an OEM rail compared to a repair rail.”

Black said there are sensors attached to the rails measure critical elements. The data can be uploaded into the CAE.

“Now we got a one-to-one for how this performs in that joint to put back into the CAE modeling to be more accurate on what we’re evaluating,” Black said. “Let’s say if this test was insufficient — we need to redesign the component or make adjustments — we would know where we need to make those adjustments based on the CAE model graphing.”

Sosa said data captured in the CAE sped up the development process for the rear rail, which only needed three iterations.

“It negated a lot of the physical testing requirements because the models were so accurate to dictate the performance,” Sosa said. “We did physical testing but the samples weren’t as extensive because the CAE model was more conclusive going through that process.”

Rivian also completed a durability test, Black said. He said it looked at how a weld would maintain over 100,000 miles.

The rear rail was most important because of a trailer hitch, he said. A weld needed to be able to hold with an added trailer hitch load.

A rear rail fixture was connected to a jig set up on the ground, he said. Pulsing ram was used to flex the rail over an extensive cycle to simulate an on-the-road use environment, he said.

Sosa said prototypes are built after the first steps are completed. The prototypes had to be made by hand because Rivian still needed to fabricate service parts.

Ten 3D-printed jigs were created then the team had to measure and remeasure to guarantee that the parts were the same as what collision centers would be supplied, Sosa said.

Next, technicians were given a draft of repair procedures and asked to complete them on the body in whites, he said. This step validates if the technicians have correct access, can weld the components, or if there are any other issues they encounter, he said.

Black said after the technician test, a service part finalization starts. This includes documenting the geometrical designs through drawings.

“As we go through that process because we want consistency, it allows for accountability going through the process, start to finish,” Black said. “If there ever is a quality concern in the future, we can track it back to whatever originally originated that particular concern and whether it was a labor issue or a component issue.”

Rivian was then able to put a request for quotes to companies to manufacture the parts, Black said.

Sosa said the final part includes bringing the technicians back in to get final feedback on the repair process.

“We take a fully drivable vehicle that we have in our workshop and we have what we would consider almost a final draft of the repair procedure from all that feedback that was done from the very beginning,” Sosa said.

Technicians of different levels are asked to do the entire procedure following the steps, Sosa said. He said the process is recorded in most cases.

“This is really to get technicians’ perspective on the repair,” Sosa said. “Do the repair procedures make sense? Is there an easier way of getting the point across to a technician? Is there something a little bit confusing? Can we get a better angle on the picture that we have in the procedure?”

Sosa said the process also helps the team evaluate what tools should be used for the repair procedure.

Black said the front rail procedures were recently published.

“One unique thing you will notice with our front frame rails is we have a skip stitch but it’s a legitimate skip stitch,” Black said. “You don’t fill the stitch. You will apply a portion of a weld starting at the corners and the top two corners, preferably. But you will stitch intentionally and not fill in the stitch because if you do, you will create too much of a heat effect in the zone and we will get an undesirable performance. In my opinion, it’s an easy instance to over-repair, in that case, because you see gaps between the welds. The gaps needed to be there to load in the way that was intended.”

Black said adding too much strength to the joint could weaken the joint.

The session was recorded, and will become available online at https://rde.scrs.com. Past sessions from the OEM Collision Repair Technology Summit are also available there today.

During this year’s SEMA Show, Black and Sosa showcased their R1S body in white at the SCRS booth. The display highlighted the different mixed materials used in the vehicle including advanced steels, aluminum, composite, and magnesium substrates. It also highlighted what types of repairs, if any, could be made on each of the materials. An overview of the showcase can be watched below.

Images

David Sosa, Rivian collision research and development workshop manager; Kelly Logan, Rivian service and collision repair programs director and Dan Black, Rivian service engineering senior manager present during the OEM Summit at the 2024 SEMA Show on Nov. 7/Lurah Lowery

Embeded images screenshot from Rivian’s presentation.