Effect of the Gyroscopic Moment, Centrifugal Force and Hydroplaning on the Critical Speed of the Vehicle

Abstract

Driving vehicles on curved roads is dangerous because of the risk of accidents. This is due to the centrifugal force, gyroscopic moment and hydroplaning of the vehicle, ending with vehicle slipping or tipping. The aim of this research is to find the critical speed under any one of the above mentioned risks. The water pressure under the vehicle tires was calculated using Matlab R2017a in order to find the pressure value that able to lift the vehicle causing slipping and then going out of control. The effect of many parameters, on the vehicle hydroplaning have been studied. These parameters are tire width, wheel load, and water layer thickness. While for vehicle slipping due to the centrifugal force or the gyroscopic moment, the following parameters have been studied. These parameters are height of vehicle gravity center, vehicle width, radius of the circular path and track angle. The results showed that the gyroscopic torque negatively affects the critical velocity of the vehicle, and it reduced it about 0.549%. The centrifugal effect is the has the greatest influence on the gyroscopic effect, and the gyroscopic effect pushes the vehicle outward and increases the radius of the rotation, while the gyroscopic couple effect, at low radius. of low rotation, is very small. Gyroscopic impact is increased by increasing the radius of the rotation path. The result also showed the increase of the road surface angle and surface at the turning the influence positively on the safe speed of the vehicle at all the above variables.