Citation

Diaz V, Fernandez MG, Roman JLS, Ramirez MR, Garcia A. Int. J. Veh. Des. 2004; 34(4): 340-353.

Affiliation

Department of Mechanical Engineering, E.P.S. Carlos III of Madrid Univ., Leganes 28911, Madrid, Spain

Copyright

(Copyright © 2004, Inderscience Publishers)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The safety of a motor vehicle driving on a curve depends on many design parameters related to the vehicle, driving conditions and roadway geometry. All of them are represented in one parameter: the rollover limit that a vehicle can reach without rolling. In this paper a new methodology for predicting the rollover limit of buses is presented. This method is based on a theoretical model and dynamics test. The equations of the model represent the vehicle dynamical behaviour when the bus is being driven on a curve. The rollover limit is calculated after some dynamic tests. The results of the tests allow to characterise the behaviour, for real conditions on a turn, of many parameters involved in the model. The dynamic tests on the road and the mathematical model predict a reliable rollover limit of a bus. The knowledge of this value will increase the safety of these vehicles.