A long-tracked bogie design for forestry machines on soft and rough terrain

A new design for a tracked forestry machine bogie (long track bogie; LTB) on soft and rough terrain is investigated using nonsmooth multibody dynamics simulation. The new bogie has a big wheel that is connected to and aligned with the chassis main axis. A bogie frame is mounted on the wheel axis but left to rotate freely up to a maximum angle and smaller wheels that also rotate freely are mounted on the frame legs with axes plane parallel to the driving wheel. The wheels are covered by a single conventional forestry machine metal track. The new bogie is shown to have higher mobility and cause less ground damage than a conventional tracked bogie but requires larger torque to create the same traction force as a conventional bogie. The new bogie also gives less acceleration when passing obstacles than the conventional bogie. Additionally, due to the shape and size of the new bogie concept, it can pass wider ditches.