You are on page 1of 2

Kinematics Definitions:

Wheelbase: distance between the centers of the front and rear wheels
Wheel Track: distance between the left and right wheels of an axle
Instantaneous center: by extending an imaginary line through the points of each
individual locating device (think A-arms or 4-link bars) until they meet the imaginary line
of the other related locating device. The point at which they meet is called the instant
center or instantaneous center
Roll center: a theoretical point around which the chassis rolls and is the intersection of
the two lines both of them pass through contact patch and instant center.
Roll Axis: an imaginary line between the front and rear roll centers.
Roll Couple: The distance between the roll center and the center of gravity
Roll Gradient: the derivative of the vehicle body roll angle with respect to the lateral
acceleration acting at its center of gravity (CG)
Roll Camber: the amount that the camber changes due to the roll of the chassis as the
vehicle goes around a corner.
Camber Gain: difference of angle between initial camber angle and the camber angle
after certain amount of suspension travel and may be due to roll angle in this case is
measured by (degree per degree of body roll)
Anti-Dive & Anti-Squat: anti-dive used in front suspension to reduce bump
deflection(compression) in braking. Anti-squat used in rear suspension to reduce bump
deflection in forward acceleration in rear drive cars only due to input horizontal forces.

Motions:
Heave bounce :vertical upward motion of the body without pitch or roll.
Bump Jounce compression: upward displacement of the wheel relative to the car
body. Double bump may be considered as negative heave.
Rebound: The opposite of bump lowering of the wheel relative to the body .

Wheel Angles:
Camber angle: The angle of the wheel with the vertical in a front view
Caster angle: is the angle between the steering axis: the axis around which the wheel
assembly swivels as it turns to the right or left and the vertical axis of a steered wheel
measured in the side view.
Toe angle: the symmetric angle that each wheel makes with the longitudinal axis of the
vehicle
Steering axis angle (Kingpin Inclination): is the angle in degrees between the steering
axis and vertical as viewed from the front. The difference between the kingpin
inclination and caster angle is illustrated in Fig(1).
Fig(1) The difference between the kingpin inclination and caster angle

References:

W.&D. Milliken - Race Car Vehicle Dynamics

Adams Herb-Chassis engineering

John Dixon -Suspension Analysis and Computational Geometry

You might also like