Dump Truck Structural Strength: EDEM-OS-2Way Co-Simulation

PrasadAvilala · November 21

Background:

A dump truck is a vehicle used to transport bulk materials, such as dirt, gravel, demolition waste, or coal. Dump trucks are used in a variety of industries for material handling, including construction, mining and quarrying

A dump truck has an open-box bed that tilts or opens at the rear for unloading. Hydraulic rams lift the front of the truck to deposit the material on the ground

Problem Statement:

Dump trucks design and manufacture faces a wide variety of challenges, majorly Tipping, Spillage, Stability, and un-balanced loads caused by offset Centre of Gravity of the load.

It is very expensive, and time consuming to perform physical trials and address the challenges by the OEM’s.

The Multi-Physics (EDEM-OS, 2-way coupled) simulation address most of the challenges experienced by OEM’s because of

Realistic structural analysis based on material loads EDEM bulk material data
Optimize equipment design based on interaction with bulk material
Simulate advanced and complex scenarios
Reduced need for testing & physical prototyping
Greater insight into equipment performance

In this demonstration example the EDEM-OS-2Way Co-Simulation, is used to understand the

Bulk Material Loading and Unloading
Truck body and Tail gate strength

Key Points to be Noted

The CAD model chosen in the simulation is a representative model that has been simplified for the purposes of this demonstration case
Only truck body is chosen for the simulation, all other parts are ignored as they don’t experience any material loads
Linear steel material is assigned to brackets, chassis frame and truck body

Prerequisites

EDEM-OS 2-way supports the software version specified below or later versions

EDEM – 2024
OptiStruct – 2024
SimLab – 2024

Dump Truck Loading and Unloading: EDEM Simulation Setup

Define the bulk material properties
Define the Particle to Particle and Particle to geometry Interactions
Define the particle shape, size and its distribution
Import the factory and truck body .stl file using CAD unit as “Meter”
Move the factory to required position using transform option
Define a factory, to create a bulk material of 7000 kg with a target mass of 5000 kg/s and a velocity of Z= -2 m/s
Define the simulation setup such as
- Raleigh Time Step = 20 %
- Simulation time = 5 sec
- GPU solver with CPU’s=6
Run the Simulation
Export the Simulation Deck at time step = 0 sec
Open the Exported simulation deck
Delete the truck body and factory
Update the environment
Switch on the coupling server

Dump Truck Loading and Unloading: OS Simulation Setup

Import the given .fem file and the fem file consists of
- 2D mesh of Dump Truck body
- 2D mesh of Tailgate
- A portion of 2D mesh of Chassis frame
- 1D elements such as Rbe2 elements
Select all bodies to define solution as Explicit Dynamics
Define settings such as
- Solver Settings
- Result Request
- Format and Execute Option
Define Joints between Tail gate and Truck body
Define Joints between Truck body bracket and Chassis
Define Contact between Truck body and Tail gate
Create Coupled Solution
Define Coupled time step