This dissertation is concerned with experimental and analytical studies of the mechanics of interaction where a pneumatic tire is loaded vertically on a supporting ground, i.e., rigid base, clay and sand. / The numerous experiments were conducted under various conditions to characterized the interactions in terms of the experimental results, e.g. axle displacement, contact area, contact pressure, etc. The results of pressure distribution indicate that recognizing a tire as a pneumatic body is crucial in establishing a rational theory for tire-supporting ground interaction problems. The pressure distribution and contact area obtained in the experiments are also utilized in validating an analytical approach (i.e. First Analytical Approach) established in the dissertation. / A hypothetical description of the progress of tire deformation is discussed based on the experimental results. The discussion helps in providing a better understanding of the mechanics of the interaction, and for selecting basic analytical and/or numerical tools in establishing the present analytical methods. / In the analytical work, the two distinct analytical approaches (i.e. First and Second Analytical Approaches) are established under the plane strain condition in predicting contact length and pressure. However, the first analytical approach is emphasized in this dissertation, while the second one is rather a complementary work. / In the first analytical approach, the real contact profile is taken into account, while the existing contact theories (by Hertz, Muskhelishvili, etc.) essentially ignore the real kinematics of contact surfaces on which the pattern of pressure distribution greatly depends. In this first analytical approach, the following steps are taken: (1) transform a tire-supporting ground interaction problem into an equivalent free boundary (-value) problem of the deformed supporting ground; this is done so that the complex factors inherent to pneumatic tires are not directly taken into the analytical formulation; (2) determine the modulus of elasticity of the deformed supporting ground by taking into account the contact profile; (3) find the contact length and pressure by means of the complex variable method. / The contact length and pressure analytically obtained are in close agreement with those obtained through experimentation. An attempt has also been made to solve the sliding interaction problems. / The second analytical approach, which is an iterative technique combining the incremental finite element method and the complex variable method, is established fundamentally to solve an interaction problem between an elastic solid and a nonlinear elastic half-plane. Two different types of interaction problems are solved, i.e. tire-clay and rigid wheel-snowpack interactions. Numerical results on contact length for both problems showed acceptable agreement with the experimental results, while those on sinkage obtained for the rigid wheel did not.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.74320 |
| Date | January 1989 |
| Creators | Ishikawa, Fumitoshi |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Doctor of Philosophy (Department of Civil Engineering and Applied Mechanics.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001064544, proquestno: AAINN63613, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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