Finite element analysis of tire performance based on trajectories.

摘要

Finite element analysis has become a very valuable tool in tire engineering in recent years. Typical tire applications have included the calculation of overall stiffness, inflated and loaded shapes, contact pressures, and internal stresses. However, most applications have stopped short of determining the distribution of tire-road shear forces for a tire with a realistic tread design. The tire-road shear forces are parallel to the plane of the road and are governed by the friction that exists between the tire and the road. These frictional forces control the performance of the vehicle, especially in cornering, accelerating, or braking maneuvers.; In this work, a new method was developed to model realistic tread lugs along with the tire carcass. The method involves the calculation of trajectories of points in common to finite element meshes of the tread lugs and the carcass. In this way, detailed tread lug geometries were modeled accurately with moderate computer resources. Previous methods either greatly simplified the tread pattern or required very long computer runs on a refined carcass mesh with detailed tread lugs.; To demonstrate the use of the method, several applications are included. Two simple tread lugs, (a square and a diamond), were modeled on a passenger tire carcass. Using these lugs, the progression of shear forces through the footprint was obtained. Two complex tread lugs were also modeled under the same loading and boundary conditions. Comparisons were made of the resulting shear forces and scrub distributions in the foot-print to validate the method.