The physical modelling of tire-road interaction phenomena developed by MegaRide UniNa spinoff company for the advanced simulation platform offered by the VI-Grade DIM250 simulator, installed in 2019 at Maserati Innovation Lab, was adopted for an innovative project aimed to the parallel development of vehicle and tires in virtual environment.
Involving the outdoor testing of a properly instrumented vehicle prototype allowed the proper parametrization of the virtual vehicle model and the identification of the tire physical behaviour in terms of relationship between frictional performance, stiffness variations and tire tread core and bulk temperature.
Such highly-relevant effects have been then reproduced thanks to an innovative approach employing an advanced version of Pacejka’s MF model, called adheRIDE, running in co-simulation with the thermoRIDE thermal model.
The results highlighted in the presented study allowed to analyse in detail the tire thermal working ranges explored in outdoor objective and subjective handling, with relevant consequences on the #grip, stiffness and footprint effects commonly considered in the design phases, showing significant variations under the different working conditions related to the typical characterization manoeuvres.
After a deep objective evaluation of thermal tire effect on driving performances the complex tire model has been implemented on Driving Simulator in order to predict the thermal status of each tire and consequentially changing tire performances that causing changes on vehicle balance and driving perception.