To guide the design of grouser parameters for lunar rover wheel,the effect analysis of circumferential angle of grousers on motion performance of a rigid wheel was conducted in a laboratory single-wheel test bed with loose sand bin.All tests had been done at a free wheel sinkage.The circumferential angle was varied from 0°,5°,10°,15° to 20°.By the analysis and comparisons of tractive and steering performance between smooth wheels and wheels with different circumferential angle grousers,the results show that the drawbar pull(DP),driving torque(DT) and steering resistance moment(SRM) decrease slightly with the increasing circumferential angle.And chevron grousers are more beneficial to improve the tractive performance than herringbone grousers.In order to evaluate motion performance of wheels with grousers,the evaluation indexes of motion performance are introduced into the experimental results.The results reveal that the optimal circumferential angle is 0°,and the optimum value of wheel slip is 13% from the perspective of saving energy to the similar loose sand in the experiments.
In order to investigate wheel slip-sinkage problem, which is important for the design, control and simulation of lunar rovers, experiments were carried out with a wheel-soil interaction test system to measure the sinkage of three types of wheels in dimension with wheel lugs of different heights and numbers under a series of slip ratios (0-0.6). The curves of wheel sinkage versus slip ratio were obtained and it was found that the sinkage with slip ratio of 0.6 is 3-7 times of the static sinkage. Based on the experimental results, the slip-sinkage principle of lunar's rover lugged wheels (including the sinkage caused by longitudinal flow and side flow of soil, and soil digging of wheel lugs) was analyzed, and corresponding calculation equations were derived. All the factors that can cause slip sinkage were considered to improve the conventional wheel-soil interaction model, and a formula of changing the sinkage exponent with the slip ratio was established. Mathematical model for calculating the sinkage of wheel according to vertical load and slip ratio was developed. Calculation results show that this model can predict the slip-sinkage of wheel with high precision, making up the deficiency of Wong-Reece model that mainly reflects longitudinal slip-sinkage.
A new kind of eight-wheel lunar rover is developed, which is a complex closed-chain system and has good capabilities of climbing slope, surmounting obstacles and adapting to uneven terrain. In this paper, the mechanical structure of the novel eight-wheel lunar rover is introduced, forward and inverse kinematic models of the rover are established according to the closed-chain coordinate transformation and instantaneous coincidence coordinate. Based on structural characteristics, its kinetic characteristics are analyzed. Wheel slippages are separated and calculated, and a method for closed-loop control modification using wheel slip estimation during the model establishment is proposed. The results can be applied to the motion control of lunar rover.
Virtual simulation technology is of great importance for the teleoperation of lunar rovers during the exploration phase,as well as the design of locomotion systems,performance evaluation,and control strategy verification during the R&D phase.The currently used simulation methods for lunar rovers have several disadvantages such as poor fidelity for wheel-soil interaction mechanics,difficulty in simulating rough terrains,and high complexity making it difficult to realize mobility control in simulation systems.This paper presents an approach for the construction of a virtual simulation system that integrates the features of 3D modeling,wheel-soil interaction mechanics,dynamics analysis,mobility control,and visualization for lunar rovers.Wheel-soil interaction experiments are carried out to test the forces and moments acted on a lunar rover’s wheel by the soil with a vertical load of 80 N and slip ratios of 0,0.03,0.05,0.1,0.2,0.3,0.4,and 0.6.The experimental results are referenced in order to set the parameters’ values for the PAC2002 tire model of the ADAMS/Tire module.In addition,the rough lunar terrain is simulated with 3DS Max software after analyzing its characteristics,and a data-transfer program is developed with Matlab to simulate the 3D reappearance of a lunar environment in ADAMS.The 3D model of a lunar rover is developed by using Pro/E software and is then imported into ADAMS.Finally,a virtual simulation system for lunar rovers is developed.A path-following control strategy based on slip compensation for a six-wheeled lunar rover prototype is researched.The controller is implemented by using Matlab/Simulink to carry out joint simulations with ADAMS.The designed virtual lunar rover could follow the planned path on a rough terrain.This paper can also provide a reference scheme for virtual simulation and performance analysis of rovers moving on rough lunar terrains.
In order to obtain a new-type short cylindrical cup-shaped flexspline that can be applied to space mechanisms,the APDL language of ANSYS software was employed to develop a parameterized equivalent contact model between a flexspline and a wave generator. The validity of the parameterized equivalent contact model was verified by comparing the results of the analytic value of the contact model and the value calculated by the theoretical formula. The curvilinear trend of stress was obtained by changing the structural parameter of the flexspline. Based on the curvilinear trend of stress,multi-objective optimizations of key structural parameters were achieved. Flexspline,wave generator,and circular spline of a new 32-type short cylindrical cup-shaped harmonic reducer were designed and manufactured. A performance test bench to carry out tests on the harmonic reducer was designed. Contrast experiments were implemented to determine the efficiency of the new 32-type short cylindrical cup-shaped harmonic reducer and the conventional 32-type harmonic reducer under different conditions. The experimental results reveal that there is approximately equality in terms of efficiency between the new 32-type short cylindrical cup-shaped harmonic reducer and the conventional 32-type harmonic reducer. The volume of the flexspline of the new 32-type short cylindrical cup-shaped harmonic reducer is reduced by approximately 30% through multi-objective optimization. When the new 32-type short cylindrical cup-shaped harmonic reducer is used on the wheel of a rover prototype,the mass of the wheel hub is decreased by 0.42 kg. Test analysis of wheel motion verifies that the new 32-type short cylindrical cup-shaped harmonic reducer can meet the requirements regarding bearing capacity and efficiency.
