Manufacturers of electric vehicles (EV) and plug-in hybrids require a variety of structural bonds to support the cars' electronics and batteries.

Strong structural adhesives, for example, are needed to hold batteries in place as vehicles travel along bumpy roads. Active cooling elements, similarly, must frequently be bonded to battery modules.

But why use adhesives and not fasteners?

In a webinar titled Material Solutions for e-Mobility, a reader had the following question for an expert from Stamford, CT-based adhesives maker Henkel:

"What are the benefits of using adhesives instead of fasteners?"

Read the response from automotive applications engineer Dalton Conlon below.

Dalton Conlon: There are a bunch of different reasons why we use adhesive instead of fasteners. For one, adhesives distribute the stress along the flange, and your fasteners have point stress concentration at certain areas.

Another reason: You have greater part tolerances. For example, you can use gap filing adhesives instead of the fastener.

The main reason of this presentation is the e-mobility. As we know, we have a lot of dissimilar substrates. The adhesives offer an opportunity to bond all these different types of composites and plastics to your aluminum substrates.

What do you think? Share your questions and comments below.