POTHOLES !

The potholes have become more frequent as road infrastructures age. Some mechanical failures in vehicle are a direct result of potholes driving maintenance and repair cost. The pothole test represents scenario in which the which the vehicle is traveling either on or off-road at various speed when a tire engages a pothole or ditch. During the pothole impact, the tire loses contact with the ground; the suspension spring will force the unsprung mass downward at acceleration much greater than the one gravity (g), which adds the gravitational acceleration acting on the center gravity of the sprung-unsprung mass systems. As the tire drops in the pothole, the vehicle is no longer in level, and the weight begins to shift more severely over the tire. As the tire hits the edge of the pothole at high speed, a huge concentrated reaction force strikes the tire directly, which results on a severe event with high accelerations, that may exceeds 100 g’s of shock load. This force will critically deform the tire, sometimes leading to rupture tire carcass cord reinforcement, or even plastic deformations of the wheel. If the wheel deformation is more, then it will lead to reduce the air pressure in tires.The pothole load is one of the critical parameter for the wheel design. The wheel deformation should be very minimal so that the tire air pressure should not reduce and there should not be any visual abnormality in and on the wheel.