Finite element analysis for wheel-soil interaction in multi-wheel systems

When?

Thursday 8 November 2012, 13:00 to Friday 9 November 2012, 14:00

Where?

Univeristy of Surrey Block AA Floor 03 Meeting Room 40

Open to:

Staff, Students

Speaker:

Juntao Qin

Abstract:
Finite element method (FEM) has been widely used in wheel-soil interaction simulations. Considering the soil to be non-linear and granular, the Drucker Prager Cap hardening model implemented in the FEM software, Abaqus, is being used by other researchers for the single wheel model. The disturbance to the soil resulting from the passage of the leading wheel is likely to change the manner in which the other wheels interact with the soil and hence the overall mobility of the vehicle. Thus the analysis of a multi-wheeled system is more realistic.
This project focuses on the interaction between the wheels in a multi-wheel system and the soil they are rolling over. This analysis is carried out for various applications including agriculture applications and Mars rovers so both the deformable pneumatic and rigid metal wheels are considered in this paper by changing the material property of the wheels. In the multi-wheel system the driving wheel is achieved by defining a force/moment-motivated wheel and the non-driving wheel is achieved by defining a velocity-motivated wheel.
The stress distribution on the surface of soil and the surface of the wheel is firstly validated by comparing the stress distribution with the contact pressure-flexible/rigid foundation on sand model and some experimental results. By examining the simulation results, the most critical time when the slippage may occur could be predicted. From the stress distribution on the soil surface, the most critical time should be the step when the back wheel is just rolling over the edge of the rut left by the front wheel. Sinkage of the wheel, reaction forces and moments on the wheel surfaces versus the displacement of the wheel system are also being analysed to give more details about the mobility of the multi-wheel system in the future work.

Bio: 
I got my BE degree in Engineering Mechanics and Aerospace from Tsinghua University (China) in 2011. During my BE study, I helped to design and develop a new structure for the Thermal Protection System of a new kind of aircraft using Finite Element Method (FEM). From then I am doing my postgraduate research in Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Surrey under supervision of Dr. Liang Cui and Dr. Marcus Matthews. The project is the investigation of Soil-Vehicle Interaction using FEM