A multiscale projection method for contact on rough surfaces

The behaviour of tires considering traction, wear and noise is mainly influenced by the roughness of the road surface. The physical interaction between the rubber and the road surface is thus very complex. Microscopical asperities of the road track are crucial for rubber friction, but general simulation methods are limited to computer the tire-road contact on idealised flat surfaces considering the roughness in empirically obtained friction laws. Multiscale methods offer great promise in modelling mechanical effects if the physical response on different length scales is of great interest. This thesis presents a new coupled multi scale projection method for the computation of contact mechanical problems considering rough surface structures. The approach is based on the independent performance of the micro scale computation only in zones of active contact on the coarse scale. The respective roughness character of each scale is covered by sinusoidal curves.