Influence of Discrete Load Cases on Optimization of Chain Guide Design of Crawler Dozers under Various Ground Conditions

<div class="section abstract"><div class="htmlview paragraph">The undercarriage is a critical component in machines such as crawlers, excavators, and compact track loaders. It includes vital elements such as the track frame, chain guides, rollers, track chains, idlers, carrier rollers, final drive, and sprockets. Among all these machines, crawler dozers encounter harsh environments with various ground conditions. During operations, the chains are subjected to traverse and side loads, which cause the chains to tend to slip out of the bottom rollers. The chain guide plays a crucial role in assisting and maintaining the chain in the correct position. The forces acting on chain guides are influenced by factors such as track chain tension, roller wear, chain link wear, and counter-rotation (where one track moves forward while the other moves in reverse). Among all the load cases, there are two critical load cases which are vital to be studied in order to determine the required number of chain guides along with other attributes like profile or section modulus. The forces exerted on the tracks are determined by developing the empirical formulae on a banked road surface. It was found that the forces acting on the inner tracks are greater than those on the outer tracks. It was found that the inner undercarriage experiences highest force at 35<sup>0</sup> slope of the surface. Apart from the machine at banked surfaces, during the counter – rotation load case, the reaction forces generated on the rotation side of the track frame are greater in the inner side than on the opposite side. These forces acting on the rotation sidetracks are used to assess the shapes and numbers of chain guides.</div></div>