Development of a FE-DEM analysis with element transfer function and its application to contact problems in terramechanics

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The discrete element method (DEM) has become popular as a numerical tool to analyze the contact problems between off-road terrain and running devices or working tools of off-road vehicles. However, DEM analysis using the elements of real soil particles has not yet been realized, since DEM is based on the computation of contact judgment and contact reaction for all elements in the analysis. To realize the above-mentioned contact analysis, an approach such as FE-DEM analysis has been proposed by our group. In this study, a new idea of transferring elements between DEM and FEM is proposed so that the total number of necessary DEM elements around contact area can be reduced. A simple example of traction performance analysis of an agricultural tire was demonstrated by FE-DEM with the proposed element transfer function. The result of the analysis showed that the elapsed time of computation could be reduced to about 29 times smaller than the conventional FE-DEM with sufficient accuracy.