45 degrees being a 100 percent slope.
Would a vehicle be apt to "fall off" a hill at an angle of greater than 4=
5
degrees, that is, would gravity be pushing the vehicle off the hill more
than it would be pushing down on the vehicle to provide traction?<
Whether a vehicle can climb a grade is dependent upon a couple of things.=
1. Traction between the tires/tracks and the surface.
2. Position of the vehicles center of gravity and the contact spot of the=
rear most tire. When the center of gravity is behind the rear most
contact spot of the rear most tire, the vehicle will flip over backwards.=
=
This is considering that the forward speed of the vehicle is constant, ie=
not accelerating. If it is accelerating or decellerating then everything=
changes.
In most cases I'd guess that traction between the surface and the tires i=
s
the biggest factor. A very low vehicle (or very long wheelbase) with lar=
ge
tires should be able to easily climb a grade of over 100 percent on dry,
high traction concrete. IE a low slung dune buggy type vehicle with lar=
ge
tires and rear wheel drive. Note that when a vehicle is going up a hill=
just before it flips over backwards, there is no downward force on the
front tires, consequently front wheel drive and front wheel traction at
that point is not even a consideration. Unfortunately this type of vehic=
le
wouldn't be very well suited for fording streams. And MVs don't often ha=
ve
to climb steep slopes of high traction concrete. I don't think that a
vehicle optimized to climb the steepest slopes would make a very good MV.=
=
So it's a compromise. (:->)
Dave
===
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