Dr. Ing. H.c. F. Porsche Aktiengesellschaft

Fred Winter

Werner Wolkersdorfer

Roberto Oggianu

Franc Praznik

Frank Sautter

Terence Tattersall

Dietmar Krase

Heinz Eberhardt

A passenger cell for a passenger vehicle has a B-pillar on each side of the vehicle body. To increase the transverse rigidity of the passenger cell in side impact loads behind the front seats, a device is provided which has a closed hollow beam extending approximately horizontally across the longitudinal direction of the vehicle with lateral ends of the device connected to the adjacent B-pillars. To create an effective device for increasing the transverse rigidity of the passenger cell for a two-door passenger vehicle having only front seats and a mid-engine placement, the device situated approximately at the shoulder height of a vehicle occupant includes a central hollow beam offset to the rear in relation to the B-pillars and connected in a force-transmitting manner to the B-pillars in front at its two laterally exterior ends via side parts that are seen as curved from above.

Passenger cell for a passenger vehicle

A passenger car is configured with a dashboard installed between a front of the car and a passenger compartment. At least two front longitudinal beams are installed at a distance from each other and are connected to this dashboard, lateral exterior frontwalls, a floor and upright A-columns. In the area of the dashboard, a support structure is provided by means of which the front longitudinal beams are connected to the upright A-columns, the frontwalls, the dashboard and the center tunnel as power transmitters. A support structure with an increased energy absorption potential that can be produced at low costs, and which is provided in the area of the dashboard, is created so that the support structure is realized as a rigid tubular frame which is installed on the dashboard facing the passenger compartment, whereby the tubular frame is connected with at least the dashboard, the A-columns and the subjacent frontwalls.

Body assembly and method of making same

Growing community of inventors

Rutesheim, Germany

Fred Winter