Abstract
This paper presents the influence of lugs (i.e., grousers) on the traveling performance of wheeled rover in various loose soils. To evaluate the influence of lugs, slope-climbing tests were performed using a two-wheeled rover with wheels equipped with lugs in sandboxes covered with Toyoura sand/lunar regolith simulant. According to the experimental results, we confirmed that an increase in the number of lugs enhances traveling performance on both soils, and it has a greater impact on lunar regolith simulant, especially for wheels with short lugs. Furthermore, an increase in lug height has a great impact even on the traveling performance of wheels with small numbers of lugs on lunar regolith simulant.
