Projeto de um aquecedor indutivo para tratamento térmico em tubos de aço do chassi de veículos Baja SAE

Abstract

The Baja SAE Project, organized by the Society of Automotive Engineers, is a student competition category aimed at challenging engineering students throughout the construction of an off-road vehicle. During the prototype manufacturing process, a wide range of engineering knowledge is applied, and electrical and mechanical designs are developed and utilized, relying on processes like tempering, annealing, and stress relief in materials. All these measures are taken to enhance the properties of the materials used in the prototype. Implementing heat treatment on parts and tubes proves highly advantageous, leading to a more resistent prototype with fewer imperfections. Therefore, this current work proposes the creation of an inductive heater with the objective of expanding the team's capabilities to carry out heat treatments and hot bending on carbon steel alloy tubes that form the vehicle's chassis. This work will introduce the principles used to develop an inductive heater, with a primary focus on the development of the DC-AC converter (inverter), resonant circuit, instrumentation system, and power supply circuit.