Computational Vibration Analysis of Vehicle Shimmy by a Power-Work Method

This paper presents the simulation of vehicle shimmy for a mid-size truck with focus on a computational analysis tool that measures the power and corresponding work in dissipating the excitation energy. After a review of shimmy theory the power and work equations and their response classification in vibrating systems are introduced. Next, model validation compares the full vehicle model to an actual test vehicle. Finally, two designs that suppress shimmy in the test vehicle are analyzed in the model by the power-work method, showing components that effectively dissipate the shimmy energy.