Skid Steering of Crawlers

This paper presents the chassis analysis of a crawler in a turn (skid-steer) situation. The analysis accounts for vehicle unbalance, both side-to-side and fore-aft. In particular, the analysis treats the case of a linear variation in track pressure as opposed to the uniform track pressure case discussed in the literature. This variation is found to produce significant differences in the track forces as is brought out in a study of turn geometry parameters and fore-aft unbalance.

Variations in radius of turn, drawbar pull, vertical loads, and external torques are presented for a hypothetical vehicle. This is indicative of studies that can be pursued in more depth.