Process for three-dimensional modeling and design of off-highway dump bodies

A process for making a body of a vehicle for hauling material having a front wall, a pair of sidewalls and a rear edge, the process comprising:

• (a) developing a three-dimensional model of a load to be carried in the body on a chassis, where the model incorporates angles of material repose in three dimensions for an actual load at an anticipated point of use and includes representations of the conical shape of an actual load;
• (b) adjusting a set of design parameters of the body until the load model center of gravity is located proximate a desired location for a load center of gravity on a chassis of the vehicle and the volume of the three-dimensional model is substantially similar to a desired volumetric capacity of the vehicle;
• and
• (c) producing the body in accordance with the adjusted set of design parameters.

A process of making a body of a vehicle for hauling material, the process comprising:

• (a) developing a three dimensional model of a load to be carried in the body on a chassis, wherein the model includes corner voids, a truncated peak, a volume and a center of gravity and wherein the three-dimensional load model is developed through a gradual incremental blending of respective side angles of material repose to front and rear angles of material repose with the angles of material repose being those of particular material to be hauled by the body;
• (b) adjusting a set of design parameters of the body until the load model center of gravity is located proximate a desired location for a load center of gravity on a chassis of the vehicle and the volume of the three dimensional model is substantially similar to a desired volumetric capacity;
• and
• (c) producing the body in accordance with the set of adjusted design parameters.

A process of making a body of a vehicle for hauling material having a front wall, a pair of sidewalls and a rear edge, the process comprising:

• (a) collecting information describing a three-dimensional shape of a heaped load of material at an anticipated point of use for the body;
• (b) developing from the collected information a three-dimensional volumetric model of a load to be carried in the body on a chassis!
• (c) adjusting a set of design parameters of the body until the load model center of gravity is located proximate a desired location for a load center of gravity on a chassis of the vehicle and the volume of the three-dimensional volumetric model is substantially similar to a desired volumetric capacity of the vehicle;
• and
• (d) producing the body in accordance with the adjusted set of design parameters.

A process of making a body of a vehicle for hauling material comprising:

• (a) developing a three dimensional model of a load to be carried in the body from information describing heaping characteristics of material to be hauled at the vehicle's anticipated point of use;
• (b) adjusting a set of design parameters of the body (1) until a volume of the three dimensional model is substantially similar to a desired volumetric capacity and (2) to allow material to be loaded into the body from a lowest practical vertical elevation over a floor of the body;
• and
• (c) producing the body in accordance with the adjusted set of design parameters.

A process of making a body of a vehicle and for holding material of particular characteristics, the process comprising:

• (a) collecting data describing a three-dimensional shape of an actual heap of the material, where the shape is affected by the particular characteristics of the material and the data includes angles of repose for the heaped material;
• (b) determining a set of design parameters for the body from the collected data;
• and
• (c) producing the body in accordance with the set of design parameters.

A process of making a body of a vehicle and for holding material, the process comprising:

• (a) modeling a three-dimensional load of heaped material carried in the body, where the load has front, back and opposing side angles representing angles of repose for the material, the modeling including (1) truncating a peak of the heap and (2) blending each of the side angles to the front and rear angles;
• (b) selecting a set of design parameters for the body that locates the center of gravity for the modeled load proximate a desired location and provides a volume of the modeled load that is substantially a desired volume;
• and
• (c) producing the body in accordance with the set of design parameters.

A process of making a body of a haulage vehicle comprising:

• (a) collecting data describing angles of repose of heaped material in three dimensions, where the data is from a working environment for the haulage vehicle and the material is a particular material whose characteristics affect the angles of repose;
• (b) modeling a body to hold a load of the material such that a center of gravity of the load determined from the collected data is proximate a desired location;
• and
• (c) producing the body based on the modeling.

A process of making a body of a haulage vehicle for hauling particular material comprising:

• (a) collecting data describing heaping characteristics of the particular material in three dimensions by observing heaping characteristics of either (1) the particular material to be hauled or (2) different material having substantially the same heaping characteristics of the particular material;
• (b) modeling in three dimensions a heaped load of the material to be carried in a body of the haulage vehicle, where the modeled heaped load includes angles of repose derived from the collected data;
• and
• (c) producing the body to hold the heaped load of the material such that when the body is mounted on the haulage vehicle and filled with an actual heaped load of the material the centroid of the actual heaped load is located proximate a predetermined location over a chassis of the haulage vehicle.