Track width and wheelbase
The track width and wheelbase will have influences on the amount of load transfer
between the front and rear axle during acceleration and braking and the load transfer
from curve inner to curve outer wheels during cornering. To investigate the interactions
between longitudinal load transfer and wheelbase a MATLAB code was used. This code
doesn’t take the alternation of the centre of gravity’s height due to the pitch-attitude into
consideration since this is small and can be neglected. In Figure 4.1 the load transfer
from the front axle to the rear axle during acceleration is presented for two different
wheelbases, 1525mm and 1700mm as an example of the output from the MATLAB
code. The methods for determine the wheelbase is primary based on the packaging as it
will decide how small the wheelbase can be. The wheelbase should be as short as
possible, but not shorter than 1525mm, to optimize the ability to make sharp corners.