Simulating Sand Kicking with a Robot Simulator

[guitardude]

Hi,

I'm working on a robot simulator and am trying to make a simplified model of kicking sand up in the air.

Right now the current information I have is:

*Wheel radius,width, mass etc.
*Contact location on the ground in the wheel and global coordinate frame
*Wheel angular velocity vector describing the wheel's rotation about the global xyz axes.

The world coordinate system is a right-handed one. It seems like if I have a positive x rotation in the global coordinate frame I want a positive y velocity on the sand as a result and some z velocity. The scale of this should be related to the tire contact point velocity.

That is a brief example but I need it to work in full 3 dimensions. Is the direction of the sand vector the same as the angular velocities about the global axes rotated using the robot's orientation? I will have to add some randomness in so that the dust spreads out, but it seems like it shouldn't be too difficult to make this behave somewhat correct.

Or am I thinking about this all wrong?

Thanks

 

[AndyW]

for reaching out and sharing your progress on your robot simulator! Kicking sand up in the air is a complex phenomenon that involves a combination of factors such as the properties of the sand, the shape and motion of the robot's wheels, and the environment in which the sand is being kicked.

To accurately model this behavior in your simulator, you will need to consider all of these factors and their interactions. It is not as simple as just using the wheel's angular velocity and contact location to determine the direction and speed of the sand particles.

One way to approach this problem is to use computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques. CFD is a powerful tool that can simulate the behavior of fluids, such as air and sand particles, in a given environment. By creating a virtual model of your robot and its surroundings, you can use CFD to calculate the forces and velocities acting on the sand particles as they are kicked up by the robot's wheels.

Another approach could be to use experimental data from real-life scenarios to inform your simulation. For example, you could record videos of sand being kicked up by different types of vehicles and use that data to calibrate your simulator. This would also allow you to introduce randomness into your simulation, as you mentioned, to make it more realistic.

In summary, accurately simulating the behavior of sand being kicked up in the air is a complex problem that requires a thorough understanding of the involved factors and their interactions. I would recommend exploring CFD techniques or incorporating real-life data into your simulation to achieve more accurate results. Good luck with your project!