Abstract
Handling instability is a serious threat to driving safety. In order to analyze the handling stability of a tractor semitrailer, a handling diagram can be used. In our research, considering the impact of multiple nonsteering rear axles and nonlinear characteristics of tires on vehicle handling stability, the handling equations are developed for description of stability of tractor semi‐trailer. Then we obtain handling diagrams so as to study the influence of driving speed, loaded mass, and fifth wheel lead on vehicle handling stability. The analysis results show that the handling stability of a tractor semi‐trailer when the tractor has two nonsteering rear axles is better than that when the tractor has only one nonsteering rear axle. While the stability in the former case is slightly influenced by driving speed and loaded mass, the latter is strongly influenced by both. The fifth wheel lead is found to only slightly influence handling stability for both tractor semi‐trailers. Therefore, to ensure the driving safety of tractor semi‐trailers when the tractor has only one nonsteering rear axle, much stricter restraints should be imposed on driving speed, and the loaded mass must not exceed the rated load of the trailer.
Highlights
Tractor semitrailers make up a large proportion of road transport vehicles due to their high transportation efficiency and economy
We introduce the characteristics of the handling diagram before looking at the handling stability simulation for a tractor semitrailer
Based on the characteristics of the handling diagram shown, equivalent definitions for understeer, neutral steer, and oversteer for complex vehicles are given in Table 1 see in 19
Summary
Tractor semitrailers make up a large proportion of road transport vehicles due to their high transportation efficiency and economy. Two different approaches are generally used to analyze vehicle handling stability: open and closed loop measurements. Unlike the former, the latter does not reflect the vehicle’s inherent stability because driver behavior is taken into consideration 4–6. There are many methods of analyzing the open loop handling stability of vehicles, including among others dynamic theory 4–10 and graphical representations 11–13. As a result, compared to dynamic theory, handling diagrams are easy to obtain and comprehensively describe handling stability for most vehicles. In this paper, the handling stability of tractor semitrailers is studied using handling diagrams, and the impact of vehicle design parameters and motion variables on the vehicle handling stability is analyzed. We refer to them as tractor semitrailers with two rear axles/one rear axle
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