PSI - Issue 82

Kübra Polat et al. / Procedia Structural Integrity 82 (2026) 267–273 K. Polat, M. M. Topaç/ Structural Integrity Procedia 00 (2026) 000–000

269

3

Table 1. Standard load cases.

Load cases

1 2

Stationary vehicle Vertical bump (3.0G)

5 6

Cornering right (1.25G) Braking & Cornering Braking in reverse Acceleration (-0.5G)

9

Accelerating & Cornering

13

Cornering right (0.75G) Cornering left (0.75G)

10 Diagonal load (front & rear) 14

3 Longitudinal bump (2.50G) 7

11 12

Vertical bump (2.25G) Vertical rebound (0.75G)

15 16

Braking (0.75G)

4

Lateral bump (2.50G)

8

Acceleration (0.5G)

As shown in Fig. 2a, the vertical (z-direction) load of a stationary vehicle (Load Case 1) was taken as the reference. Force coefficients in the other directions were determined relative to this reference. In this study, the wheel load was calculated by assuming the front axle’s vertical load (2F) was evenly distributed between the wheels. Using this load, the forces at the wheel contact point were determined. This contact point (E) and the distance from the wheel rotation axis (H) are determined according to the vehicle's tire dimensions. Subsequently, the calculated forces were applied to these points in the Finite Element Analysis (FEA). The load distribution is shown in Fig. 2b. ! ! !

! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

"!

!"

-1 0 1 2 3

View x

x y z

z

x

! ! ! ! !

Force Coefficient

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111213141516

E

F

F

Tyre contact patch

Load Cases

! ! ! !

Fig. 2. (a) Coefficients for driving conditions (according to Heißing and Ersoy, 2010); (b) Schematic representation of the load distribution used in the study. 3. Finite Element Model The FEA model includes two supports (C, D), a front axle beam, and two knuckles. The analysis model has been placed at the support points (C, D) where the displacement is constrained. The distance between the supports equals the vehicle’s track width (t). Vertical loads were applied from the spring seat surfaces (A, B). The Finite Element (FE) model used SOLID187 elements, which are ten-node solids with three translational degrees of freedom per node. The FE model consists of 202,445 elements and 324,198 nodes and the load model was shown in Fig. 3. !

!

!

t

!

Wheel

!

F

F

!

D

C

F

F

A

B

C

D

H

z

Axle Beam

Spring Seat

H

z

y

!

y

E

E, F: Tyre contact patch

F

! ! ! !

F

F

E

F

Fig. 3. Load model and boundary conditions used in the FEA.