Styled by TATA’s Spanish coach and bus
manufacturer, Hispano Corracera, ACGL
has ambitious plans for this segment of the
public transport market. In its first full year
of production the company expects to capture
20% of the luxury coach market and it
anticipates that it will be the dominant
player by the end of the second year.
As well as being the company’s first luxury
coach, the Divo is ACGL’s first public transport
vehicle to feature sandwich composites.
The move from single skin GRP to
sandwich construction for the front of the
coach (fascia as it is known in India) and the floor is for a variety of reasons.
One of
the biggest advantages has been the increase
in safety performance of the coach due the better structural properties of sandwich - in
particular impact strength. At the same time
the weight of the components have been
reduced thereby resulting in improved fuel
efficiency. Another benefit of the sandwich
approach is better NVH (noise, vibration
and harshness coefficients).
These buses will be operated by fleet
operators to fully realize the advantages
of weight reduction, NVH etc and the
influence it has on operational efficiency
before adding new buses.
Both the 30 m2 (323 ft2) floor and the
22 m2 (237 ft2) fascia will be produced
using an industrialized core infusion process.
Initially production of these components
will be carried out by a sub-supplier but
eventually they will be produced in house at
ACGL’s facility.
In addition to supplying the structural
cores for both the floor and the fascia, Diab engineers provided the laminate schedules
and process recommendations.
www.acglgoa.com