*Article* **Design and Structural Analysis of a Front Single-Sided Swingarm for an Electric Three-Wheel Motorcycle**

#### **Polychronis Spanoudakis \*, Evangelos Christenas and Nikolaos C. Tsourveloudis**

School of Production Engineering & Management, Technical University of Crete, 73100 Chania, Greece; echristenas@isc.tuc.gr (E.C.); nikost@dpem.tuc.gr (N.C.T.)

**\*** Correspondence: hroniss@dpem.tuc.gr

Received: 31 July 2020; Accepted: 27 August 2020; Published: 1 September 2020

**Abstract:** This study focuses on the structural analysis of the front single-sided swingarm of a new three-wheel electric motorcycle, recently designed to meet the challenges of the vehicle electrification era. The primary target is to develop a swingarm capable of withstanding the forces applied during motorcycle's operation and, at the same time, to be as lightweight as possible. Di fferent scenarios of force loadings are considered and emphasis is given to braking forces in emergency braking conditions where higher loads are applied to the front wheels of the vehicle. A dedicated Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) software is used for the structural evaluation of di fferent swingarm designs, through a series of finite element analysis simulations. A topology optimization procedure is also implemented to assist the redesign e ffort and reduce the weight of the final design. Simulation results in the worst-case loading conditions, indicate strongly that the proposed structure is e ffective and promising for actual prototyping. A direct comparison of results for the initial and final swingarm design revealed that a 23.2% weight reduction was achieved.

**Keywords:** swingarm; single-sided; Finite Elements Analysis (FEA); three-wheel motorcycle; topology optimization
