A Study on Structural Safety of a Urethane Wheel Using FEM

유한요소법을 이용한 우레탄 휠의 구조 안전성에 관한 연구

Urethane is a high polymeric and elastic material useful in designing mechanic parts that cannot be molded in rubber or plastic material. Especially, urethane is high in mechanical strength and anti-abrasive. Hereby, an urethane coated aluminum wheel is used for supporting of OHT vehicle moving back and forth to transport products. For the sake of verifying the safety of the vehicle, structural safety for applied maximum dynamic load on a urethane wheel needs to be carefully examined while driving. Therefore, we have performed the dynamic simulation on the OHT vehicle model. Although the area definition of applied load can be obtained from the previous study of Hertzian and Non-Hertzian contact force model when having exact properties of contact material, static analysis is simulated, since the proper material properties of urethane have not been guaranteed, after we have performed the actual contact area test for each load. In case of this study, the method of distributing load for each node is included. Finally, in comparison with result of analysis and load-displacement curve obtained from the compression test, we have defined the material properties of urethane. In the analysis, we have verified the safety of the wheel. After all, we have performed a mode analysis using the obtained material properties. With the result, we have the reliable finite element model.