Modeling and Experimental Validation of an Off-Road Truck’s (4 × 4) Lateral Dynamics Using a Multi-Body Simulation

Abstract

In the automotive sector, the use of multi-body software for modeling of existing vehicles has become essential due to its advantages in understanding vehicle dynamics in different situations and improving vehicle performances. This paper aims to model an off-road truck (4 × 4) by using ADAMS software 2020. Several steps must be achieved, including experimentally identifying some truck characteristics such as the mass, center of gravity coordinates, and tire vertical stiffness. The truck features leaf springs in both the front and rear suspensions, which must be validated before their integration into the full model due to their modeling complexity. This validation is performed by comparing the force–displacement characteristics obtained experimentally with simulation results from ADAMS, showing a good agreement. Then, the full truck is modeled in ADAMS software and validated through an experimental test using a repeated double-lane change scenario with two tests for the validation of the truck’s lateral dynamics. The comparison between the results shows a good correlation, validating the multi-body truck model.