Flexible Cellular Structures of a Non-Pneumatic Tire

Taking the tire of the lunar rover as the research background, this paper provides two design concepts of non-pneumatic tires (NPTs) with a compliant cellular solid spoke component. In this study, a series of degrees of freedom (DOFs) and stiffness analysis of NPTs with cellular structures are investigated with the same vertical loading conditions using a commercial finite element analysis tool, ANSYS. The research found that the tread relative to the hub only has in-plane translational degree of freedom in the radial direction, without other DOFs. According to this finding, using the improved design method based on the existing cellular structures and the synthetic design method based on the principle of compliant mechanism, two cases of cellular structures are designed: (i) cross arcs cell and (ii) rectangular cell. Analysis of the influence of geometric parameters of the cell on the performance of NPTs is critical to further improve the performance of the NPTs. Finally, by optimizing the geometrical parameters of the cellular structure, the performance of the NPTs with the cross arcs cell and rectangular cell can be enhanced.