Tofaş is an organization focused on technology and continuous development with its 310 engineers, 540 technical staff and 3300 workers. Set up in the month of December in the year 1994 as affiliated to the Industrial Planning and R & D Directorate, Tofaş R & D Center is the biggest research and development unit in Turkish Automotive Industry with its equipment and its professional staff.

In the center where 12 million dollars of investment was made in the areas of suspension, body, engine and emission, vibration and acoustic between the years 1995-2002, 49 engineers of 5 out of whom hold a Phd, 36 university graduate technicians and 49 specialist technical staff are employed, the staff of engineers and technicians contribute in almost all the projects of Tofaş.

In the center where there are 15 Catia stations and modern project methods like virtual modeling systems, terminated elements software, suspension analyses are deployed, the noise, vibration and comfort analyses for new projects are performed and collaboration is done with Fiat Auto in the crash analyses. Besides, many research projects are conducted with support from TÜBİTAK and TTGV, collaboration is done in these projects with FIAT Research Center and foreign design centers as well as the teaching faculty of METU, ITU, Uludağ and Mimar Sinan Universities.

Being the leader in the Turkish automotive industry, Tofaş continues its work towards providing products that are ‘world class quality’ and ‘most appropriate to Turkey’s conditions’ to the Turkish citizens with its background of more than a quarter century.

Benefiting from the experience that its partner Fiat has in product and technology development, Tofaş targets highest level customer satisfaction not only in the Turkish market but also in the markets to which it makes exportations.

The mission of Tofaş R & D is to actualize the product changes and updates in line with ‘Unconditional Customer Satisfaction’ principle, to respond to the market needs in time and in an economic manner, to develop products in the fastest and most cost-effective way and to conduct the quality improvement activities. Its vision is to be the best among the car production centers of Fiat-Auto in terms of its performance in quality improvement and cost reduction and to become the center of excellence in the selected areas by taking into consideration the opportunities in Turkey.

Research – Development Simulations Various maneuvers that determine the vehicle dynamic as well as whether the vehicle developed in the virtual environment meets the desired criteria can be seen in the digital environment via the complete vehicle model created in the virtual environment. In the attached simulation, the effect of the newly developed suspension on the vehicle dynamic and the effect of the current suspension on the vehicle dynamic are compared. This difference between the activity of the vehicles with different suspensions which do the same maneuver in the same speed can also be clearly seen in this animation.


Simulation 1 (Download)

In this simulation, the parallel wheel movement, one of the elasto-kinematic analyses performed during the development of suspension systems is seen. The suspension system contains the connection coordinates of all the elements constituting the suspension, the characteristics of the elastic bushes, springs and shock absorbers used in these connections. The elasto-kinematic analyses are the analyses that determine the characteristic of the suspension system of a vehicle. Via these analyses, parameters like camber, toe and caster peculiar to the suspension systems are determined. These parameters are important parameters that have impact on the complete vehicle dynamic and it is compulsory that they be at certain intervals.

Simulation 2 (Download)