Quantitative research on vehicle energy consumptions based on the longitudinal-vertical dynamics of the tracked vehicle

Abstract

In this paper, a longitudinal-vertical coupling tracked vehicle dynamic model is established to simultaneously describe the longitudinal, vertical and pitch dynamic responses of the tracked vehicle under off-road conditions. The road wheels are subjected to variable longitudinal-vertical forces due to the terrain unevenness and the excitations are transmitted to the vehicle body through the torsion suspension system. An experiment by means of a scaled-down tracked vehicle was carried out. The comparisons between the field test results and simulation results verified the effectiveness of the coupling dynamic model on predicting the vehicle dynamics. Taking advantage of the coupling tracked vehicle dynamic model, the energy computation formulas are further derived to quantitatively study the vehicle energy consumptions. The energy consumption distributions of the tracked vehicle on uneven road and paved road at different velocities are analysed. The computation results indicate that the developed energy computation method is reliable on predicting the energy generation and dissipation of the tracked vehicle. It has been found that the proportions of damping dissipation energy and road roughness caused energy consumption to total energy consumption are both higher at a greater speed.