Modeling of flexible metal wheel for pressurized lunar rover and traction performance prediction

The pressurized lunar rover has become one of the most important equipment in lunar exploration and resource utilization missions. On the terrain of soft lunar regolith, the rover wheels are easy to slip, sink, or even fail to move. To improve the traction performance of the rover on soft lunar soil, it is necessary to study the interaction between the wheels and the lunar soil. The deformation of the flexible wheel provides a larger contact area, which results in greater tractive force. Moreover, flexible wheels have better comfort and stability than rigid wheels, which are needed for manned rovers. However, there are few studies on the wheel soil interaction model of the heavy flexible wheel for the pressurized lunar rover. In this paper, a metal flexible wheel soil interaction model for pressurized lunar rovers was established, and the traction performance of the flexible wheel was predicted by using this model. Then, the accuracy of the wheel soil interaction model was verified by the soil bin test. The experimental results showed that the average error between the theoretical value of sinkage and the experimental value was 13.9%, and the average error between the theoretical and experimental value of drawbar pull was 11.5%, indicating that the model has high prediction accuracy. The new model can be used to predict the traction performance of flexible wheels and the experimental results can provide a reference for the flexible wheel design lunar rovers