Development of a Passive Suspension System for an Autonomous Tracked Unmanned Ground Vehicle Using a Multibody Dynamics Approach

In the last two decades, the use of Unmanned Ground Vehicles in civil, industrial, and military applications has grown significantly. In off-road scenarios and severe operating conditions, the suspension system is a critical element. In this context, this work develops a nonconventional suspension for tracked vehicles inspired by passenger-car suspensions. A suspension designed according to this scheme allows greater adjustment and easier maintenance than classic tracked vehicle schemes. In the introductory phase, the different suspension systems are analyzed, and then the design phase proceeds. Specifically, the design phase includes a section dedicated to schematizing the problem as a two-degree-of-freedom system, followed by a section analyzing the software implementation of the system, which leads to the derivation of the characteristic values of the elastic element and the shock absorber. These parameters will then be used in a further system for an analysis focused on both the vertical displacement and the roll of the full vehicle. The last section involves analyzing the designed system by calculating two performance indices, namely road holding and payload comfort.