ID 31 Continuous Track Design Mason Chen, Timothy Liu, and Jason Li

Poster ID 31 Continuous Track Design Mason Chen, Timothy Liu, and Jason Li

• Project Objective: – Study Continuous Track Design – Apply Minitab Statistics • Project Scope: – Play Hill Climb Racing Video Game – Use Mountain Stage and Assess Five Cars • Project Hypotheses: – Any significant Player Dependency (Reproducibility) – Continuous Track Design better than Wheel Design?

• Continuous track, also called tank tread or caterpillar track, is a system of vehicle propulsion in which a continuous band of treads or track plates is driven by two or more wheels. • The large surface area of the tracks distributes the weight of the vehicle, enabling a continuous tracked vehicle to traverse soft ground with less likelihood of becoming stuck due to sinking.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuous_track

Advantages of Wheel Design Advantages of Continuous Track • Lower Production Costs Design • Higher Maneuverability • Higher Power Efficiency • Lighter Weight • Higher Traction/Friction • Design Simplicity • Moving on Rough Terrain • More Material Selection • Less Ground Impact/Damage • Weight Growth Potential Disadvantages of Wheel Design Disadvantages of Continuous • Drive over Obstacles Track Design • Lower Speed • Less Maneuverability • Easier Track Broken • Shorter Life Cycle • Difficult to Repair https://www.intorobotics.com/wheels-vs-continuous-tracks-advantages-disadvantages/

• Measurement System Analysis • Failure Mode Analysis • Select and Compare Five Best Cars – Wheel Design: Hot Rod with Bigger Tire Size, and Moon Lander with Lifting Feature – Continuous Track Design: Tank (heavier), Super Offroad (lighter), and Hovercraft (larger contact area) • Upgrade Car and Build Regression Model – Identify which wheel/track design has more potential to overcome Mountain Stage Challenges

• Repeatability: run the same car on the same Mountain Stage for 10 Times: ensure player is well trained and who can repeat the same measurement • Result: the distribution IQR= 168, Standard deviation= 120 due to two failure modes observed. Repeatability is acceptable.

© IEOM Society International 8 Measurement System Analysis II (Reproducibility) Train three Players and check whether three players can reproduce the similar score distribution. • Three Players (Player C, Player J, and Player M) demonstrated similar score pattern (no reproducibility concern)

Two Cars with Continuous Track Design (Track, Super Offroad) showed higher upgrade potential on the Mountain Stage © IEOM Society International 10 Build Regression Model

Tank Regression Model has shown Slope= 29.95 (Highly Upgrading Potential) and R-Square= 97.4% (Highly Accurate Model)

• Continuous Track Design has shown a higher potential than Wheel Design to run over the modulated peaks • Heavier Continuous Track Tank has a better prediction (97.4%), though Lighter Super Off-Road has a better Potential Slope • Even with Bigger Tire Size, Hot Rod still could not survive on the highly modulated Mountain Stage

Pros: • It's very fast • Can reach long distances • Can climb tall hills • Stay more often on the ground than in the air

Cons: • It's very easy to lose the spoiler • When you lose the spoiler, it's difficult to drive • Can't make any flips unless you lose a spoiler • Fuel runs pretty quickly (within 47sec) http://neckflip.wixsite.com/hillclimbracing/super-offroad © IEOM Society International 13 Conclusions

• Conducted Measurement System Analysis: passed both repeatability and reproducibility • Designed a successful experiment to study the Car Upgrade Potential among five different cars • Demonstrated the Advantages of Continuous Track Design over the Wheel Design on the Mountain Stage

Future Work

• Further Study the Track Design Upgrade Technologies: Engine, Suspension, Tire, Fuel, and Downforce