SE:kond LIFE - Remanufacturing & reuse of vehicle components

Important results from the project

The project SE: Kond LIFE aims to investigate the environmental, economic and technical potential for re-use and re-manufacture of vehicle components that are today material recycled. The project´s goal has been to study detailed crashed front and rear wheel suspension systems from passenger cars as representative examples and thereby lay the foundation for how more components can be reused in circular systems.

Expected long term effects

The conditions for re-manufacturing both in the short and long term have been studied. New customer and sustainability requirements drive the automotive industry´s business models towards developing services instead of selling cars and this affects the reuse of vehicle components. The need for efficient, flexible systems for re-manufacturing and reuse is expected to increase significantly with future car use. Re-manufacturing is expected to be a part of a larger system to extend the life of the vehicle while keeping the environmental impact and costs low.

Approach and implementation

The project has investigated the conditions for expanding the systems for reuse from both the environmental and environmental perspective. There is a good potential even in the short term perspective and various methods for defect analysis and re-manufacturing of individual components from crashed front and rear wheel suspension systems of passenger cars have been investigated in order to streamline the flows for re-manufacture and reuse. A method for determining when components should be re- manufactured versus material recycled has also begun during the project.