Abstract
A three-dimensional finite-element (FE) dynamic model is proposed to study the dynamic responses of a contact-type viscoelastic suspension used in crawler construction vehicles. Some important characteristics of the viscoelastic suspension are obtained based on the FE computation and analysis, such as the stress concentration regions, the distribution of “heat spot,” the potential failure modes and positions, and so on. Suggestions for improving the dynamic performance of the suspension are put forward. The proposed model is verified by comparing the suspension's deformation results from the FE model with those from the corresponding dynamic experiment. The research methods and results are available to develop high-performance viscoelastic suspensions used in crawler construction vehicles.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to thank the Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education of China (Project No. 200801090001) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project No. 50475050) for their support of this research.
Notes
#Communicated by G. Hulbert.