Inertia coupling analysis of a self-decoupled wheel force transducer under multi-axis acceleration fields

PLoS One. 2015 Feb 27;10(2):e0118249. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0118249. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

Wheel force transducer (WFT), which measures the three-axis forces and three-axis torques applied to the wheel, is an important instrument in the vehicle testing field and has been extremely promoted by researchers with great interests. The transducer, however, is typically mounted on the wheel of a moving vehicle, especially on a high speed car, when abruptly accelerating or braking, the mass/inertia of the transducer/wheel itself will have an extra effect on the sensor response so that the inertia/mass loads will also be detected and coupled into the signal outputs. The effect which is considered to be inertia coupling problem will decrease the sensor accuracy. In this paper, the inertia coupling of a universal WFT under multi-axis accelerations is investigated. According to the self-decoupling approach of the WFT, inertia load distribution is solved based on the principle of equivalent mass and rotary inertia, thus then inertia impact can be identified with the theoretical derivation. The verification is achieved by FEM simulation and experimental tests. Results show that strains in simulation agree well with the theoretical derivation. The relationship between the applied acceleration and inertia load for both wheel force and moment is the approximate linear, respectively. All the relative errors are less than 5% which are within acceptable and the inertia loads have the maximum impact on the signal output about 1.5% in the measurement range.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Acceleration*
  • Motor Vehicles*
  • Torque
  • Transducers*

Grants and funding

The work is supported by Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant 51305078), Suzhou Science & Technology Project (Grant SYG201303), Colleges and Universities in Jiangsu Province plans to graduate research and innovation (Grant KYLX_0107) and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.