A new parameterized modeling method Adams Tracked Vehicle (ATV) is used to construct the multi-body system model of the Self-Propelled Vehicle (SPV), a special tracked vehicle traveling on the seabed for 6000 m deep ocean mining. The dynamic analysis software is used to analyze the simulation of the SPV walking on the four kinds of virtual seabed terrains respectively, the results of the dynamics simulation experiments indicate that the virtual topotype of the SPV is able to travel on the seafloor terrain models successfully and the motion performance of the SPV proved to be satisfactory. This parameterized modeling method can be applied to dynamic study of various tracked vehicles traveling on soil terrain with different terramechanical property by adjusting the respective parameters of the tracked vehicle and soil terrains. The tracked vehicle dynamic topotype created in the method can be applied to the study for its analysis of characteristics, optimization of parameters and optimum control of system.
In the deep ocean mining system, a miner collects accumulating manganese nodules on the deep seabed. SPV is a carrier equipped pickup unit, crusher, hydraulic system, electronic box, and flexible pipe etc as shown in Fig. 1. It is designed to move on maximum 6000 m deep seabed and should provide with good maneuverability, well traffic ability and high reliability, so as to ensure normal operation and high efficiency (Li, 1997). Because the complex deep-sea environment doesn't allow frequent experiments of SPV crawling on seabed, so the simulation research on SPV for deep ocean mining is especially important. The dynamic analysis software can construct multi-body models of mechanical systems and simulate the full-motion behavior of the models. It claimed to be especially developed for modeling and dynamic simulation of tracked vehicle mechanical system.
