Dynamic modelling, validation and handling performance analysis of a skid-steered vehicle

Skid-steering technology has been widely used for wheeled vehicles, because a skid-steered vehicle has great mobility so that it is able to pivot steer a larger internal hull volume. In this paper, an 8 × 8 skid-steered all-terrain vehicle equipped with a double-stream hydromechanical transmission was introduced. In order to discuss the handling performance and to obtain general conclusions, an analytical lateral dynamic model of a skid-steered vehicle was proposed and verified experimentally. Furthermore, the handling performance of the skid-steered vehicle was compared with an Ackermann steered vehicle of the same dimensions. The results show that the skid-steered vehicle has a lower 'stability factor' and a totally different motion attitude, that the turn centre of the skid-steered vehicle will move forwards during acceleration at a constant radius and that the transient handling performance of the skid-steered vehicle is better than that of the Ackermann steered vehicle. Furthermore, from an analysis of the lateral slip angles of the tyres during a constant-radius turn, it can be concluded that the tyres of a skid-steered vehicle easily become worn because of the larger lateral slip angles.