Abstract: Experiments were performed to investigate the sinkage of wire mesh wheel under light load (in the range of 20 N to 60 N), which mimic the low gravity environment on lunar surface. The wheel load and wheel speed are taken as the experimental factors, the wheel sinkage is taken as the experimental index, and orthogonal experiment design method is adopted. The experiments were carried out on a single-wheel test bed for the wire wheels under three simulant regolith conditions. The actual wheel sinkages were collected, and the apparent sinkages were measured using a rut morphology laser scanning device. Using regression analysis, three linear regression equations were worked out with confidence degree of 0.99 and square correlation coefficients all above 0.9. The relative error between the actual wheel sinkage and the calculated sinkage by the regression equations ranged from 0.34% to 8.24%. The variation trend of the laser scanned apparent sinkage was in consistent with the actual sinkage. The linear relationship between the sinkage and the wheel load was obvious. This study verified that the actual sinkage can be predicted from the apparent sinkage.

Key words: spacecraft structure and design, light load, wire mesh wheel, wheel sinkage, apparent sinkage, simulant regolith