Wheels and Power Transmission

By Saarthak Marathe
Wheels
• Current Wheels:
The current wheels are the ones used in RC Rovers.
They have outer casing made of rubber and inside is
filled with polyurethane foam.
Disadvantages:
The ground clearance is very less and the rover may hit
rocks and other objects in the path.
The traction provided is very high because the foam is
very compressible. This in turn increases the load on the
motor.
• Non-Pneumatic Tyres:
Non-Pneumatic tyres are tyres without any inner filling or
proper tyres.
They are known as Airless Tyres.
The various patterns of available are:

Diamond Hexagonal
 Spokes Triangular

The deformation for the diamond shape is the least but

the weight due to the diamond shape will increase a lot.
Whereas the difference between deformation of
hexagonal and diamond is not much and weight of
hexagonal is the least.
• Honeycomb tyres are most convenient to replace the
conventional tyre since they provide uniform traction
and wear as that of conventional tyre.
• The hexagonal mesh will be made with rubber with bolt
holes on the inner thickness of the rubber which will be
connected to the plate connecting the hub of the wheel.
• The outer threading will be coupled to the outer plate of
wheel the help of rubber extensions from threading .
This rubber extension lies between two plates (one inner
and outer). This properly couples the wheels.
• The threading will be coupled to the compliance with the
help of rubber glue.
• Different Non-Pneumatic Wheel:
• The new wheel is made of continuous torus design. This
design is based on the numerical research done by researchers
of Qatar University.
• The wheel will be made of Fiber
• Reinforced polymer. This
• provides stiffness to the wheel.
• The substitute to this can be
• nitrile rubber. The deflection
• for this tire is very low.
•
• The overall deformation of the tire is confined more to
the top of the tire (near the loading zone) instead of the
sidewall which is designed to provide the required
elasticity in the tire.
• To solve this issue, and allow both the stress and the
deformation to reach the elastic part of the tire, located
in the sidewall, the circular integrity of the tire should be
broken.
• One possible way to do it is by introducing a set of tiny
cuts in the sides of the tire
Power Transmission
Problems faced by current Mechanism:
• The current power transmission has the problem of
slipping of the belt when the rover tries to move. This in
turn fails the steering mechanism of the rover .
• The solution to this can be to use the sprocket-chain
instead of fiber material belt. This will lead to proper
coupling of gear to the chain and prevent slipping. But
this may lead to a backlash, which can be considered
negligible.
• The use of sprocket-chain instead of a belt with high
thickness leads to prevention of space and proper
transmission.
New Mechanism:
• The new mechanism will use the same floating axle as
used in the current rover.
• As the radial and axial load is not much, the current
floating axle will suffice.
• The motor instead of keeping on the main body
can be kept above the wheel
• This will prevent the radial, axial load if it was
kept in the axis of the wheel and won’t require
the use of the long pulley-belt system