Armored Vehicle Track Elastomers: Research and Development at MRL (Materials Research Laboratories)

摘要

The Australian Army employs two basic types of Armored Fighting Vehicle (AFV) fitted with rubberized (elastomeric) track designs. The M113 Armored Personnel Carrier entered the Australian service in the 1960's and the Leopard AS1 Main Battle Tank in the 1970's. Adoption of elastomeric components in the form of bushings, roadwheel treads, roadwheel pads (roadwheel-side trackshoe pads) and track pads (ground-side track-shoe pads) has provided many improvements in track performance and maintenance requirements. However, the number of such components exhibiting field damage forwarded to MRL for investigation in the early 1980's indicated that the elastomers being used were not optimum for Australian conditions. This paper presents aspects of the work undertaken to improve track elastomer formulations for local industry production and AFV use.