An overview of the early stage of vehicle modeling and design

This is a paper intended for initial stage of vehicle modeling and design. The needs to determine a variety of vehicle suspension parameters required for initial design has been difficult and time-consuming task. In order to facilitate a concise and efficient presentation of initial vehicle design procedure, this paper uses a mathematical model and physical geometry. Vehicle model consists of dimensions, inertias and mechanical constants. These vehicle model parameters divided into several categories : basic parameters, coefficients and constants, design specification, spring and damper, bush stiffness, stabilizer bar, suspension geometry, tire, and vehicle weights of various design condition. This paper uses a vehicle design fundamental (VDF) program running under Windows 95 graphical interface. The features of VDF will be briefly outlined in this paper.