ABSTRACT
Collision between bodies or sudden contact of one body with the ground could occur in some applications of multibody systems. This chapter considers the deformation, shape, and possibly other features of the contacting bodies. It assumes that the impact causes the contacting bodies to have local deformation in the contact region. The force of the deformation is represented as a linear or nonlinear spring–damper force element that applies a pair of resistive forces on the two bodies in a continuous form during the period of contact. The chapter determines the velocities immediately after an impact based on the velocities before the impact and a parameter describing the characteristic of the impacting bodies. A contact force model can be viewed as a logical point-to-point spring–damper that is only active during the period of contact. The contact of a wheel/tire with the ground can be represented as a simple spring–damper model.
