汽车悬架的原-外文翻译.docx

TherincipleOf Car Suspensions By William HarrisUniversity of MichiganWhen people think of automobile performance, they normally think of horsepower, torque and zero-to-60 acceleration. But all of the power generated by a piston engine is useless if the drivercant control the car. Thats why automobile engineers turned their attention to the suspension system almost as soon as they had mastered the four-stroke internal combustion engine.The job of a car suspension is to maximize the friction between the tires and the road surface, to provide steering stability with good handling and to ensure the comfort of the passengers. In this article, well explore how car suspensions work, how theyve evolved over the years and where the design of suspensions is headed in the future.1.VehicleDynamicsIf a road were perfectly flat, with no irregularities, suspensions wouldnt be necessary. But roads are far from flat. Even freshly paved highways have subtle imperfections that can interact with the wheels of a car. Its these imperfections that apply forces to the wheels. According to Newtons laws of motion, all forces have both magnitude and direction. A bump in the road causes the wheel to move up and down perpendicular to the road surface. The magnitude, of course, depends on whether the wheel is striking a giant bump or a tiny speck. Either way, the car wheel experiences a vertical acceleration as it passes over an imperfection.Without an intervening structure, all of wheels vertical energy is transferred to the frame, which moves in the same direction. In such a situation, the wheels can lose contact with the road completely. Then, under the downward force of gravity, the wheels can slam back into the road surface. What you need is a system that will absorb the energy of the vertically accelerated wheel, allowing the frame and body to ride undisturbed while the wheels follow bumps in the road.The study of the forces at work on a moving car is called vehicle dynamics, and you need