How does the positon of the wheels change when the vehicle runs on a bumpy road or over an obstacle? What happens when the drivers brakes suddenly?
These are questions, which engineers deal with in the development of new vehicles. They undertake extensive tests to optimize the vehicle dynamics. These include the measurement of the wheel clearance, the determination of the wheel parameters track, camber, spring deflection and steer angle. For the realisation of the necessarily test drives, steering robots are deployed more and more often, performing programmed steering manoeuvres precisely and most of all reproducible.
One of the leading developer and distributer of steering robots is AB Dynamics (ABD). The simple combination of the AICON WheelWatch system with an ABD steering robot enables the measurement of 6D wheel motion of a robot-controlled vehicle. Via a CANBus interface the measurement data are submitted to a robot data acquisition system in real time and are thus immediately available, synchronised with the data of the steer angle. Driving test are made much more efficient and deliver precise measurement results.
AICONs measuring system WheelWatch allows non-contact high-speed monitoring of wheel motion in all 6 degrees of freedom. There is no mechanical connection between sensor and wheel. The position of the camera does not have to be stable as the AICON WheelWatch recalculates its position continuously using the reference targets on the vehicle fender. Therefore, the motion of the camera system has no influence on the precision of the measurement.
