Non-pneumatic Tire-Mars Soil Interaction Using Advanced Computational Techniques 2023-01-0022

The physical characteristics of Mars's soil have an impact on how easily a spacecraft can land and navigate the planet's surface. On the surface of Mars, wheeled robots known as "rovers" were planted to carry out scientific investigations on the planet's historical temperature, surface geology, and possibilities for past or current life. The challenges of guiding mobile robots across terrain that is sloping, rocky, and deformable have brought to light the significance of creating precise simulation models of the tire and mars soil interaction. In this paper, current efforts to create a terramechanics-based model of rover movement using a Non-Pneumatic (NP) tire on planetary surfaces are discussed. Since no rocks or soils have been brought back to Earth from Mars, Martian simulants are frequently used for testing rovers and other devices for Mars terrain research. Using a Finite Element Analysis-based NP tire model that is modeled and tested, in addition to a dry loose Martian soil that is modeled using Smoothed-Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) technique and calibrated using pressure-sinkage and direct shear test. The rolling resistance coefficient on a Mars simulant can be investigated and analyzed. Results obtained from this research will validate the sustainability of NP tires for future Exploration of Mars.