If you go off-roading in any capacity, you know sometimes even all-terrain tires don’t cut it. Thankfully, the minds at Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) have been hard at work to find an alternate solution.
Yes, the research arm of the US Department of Defense would like to introduce the Reconfigurable Wheel-Track, or, in military lingo, “RWT”. No, your eyes aren’t playing tricks on you. This really is a wheel and tire combination that can change while in motion.
The design for the RWT comes from a team at the Carnegie Mellon University National Robotics Engineering Center. In normal operating mode, the wheel and tire are round like almost every other vehicle. This provides high-speed mobility and normal car handling.
However, as soon as it encounters rough or soft terrain like mud, it can transform into a triangular design. In this mode the wheel stops rotating and the tracks start moving. The wheels can change between forms in two seconds, and you don’t even have to slow down.
You might ask yourself, isn’t this a bit complex? The answer is yes, very. But this is the goal of DARPA. It looks at proof-of-concept ideas and works to develop them for future use on the battlefield.
Chances are, like most military hardware concepts, this system will never make it onto a combat vehicle. Even if the RWT never makes it out of the concept phases though, it’s still pretty cool, and there’s a market for something like this in the civilian space.
One example of this comes from the 2017 LA Auto Show. There, GM showed off the GMC Sierra 2500HD All Mountain Concept. Instead of tires like a normal truck, it made use of Mattrack treads. Other examples also come from Ken Block and his F-150 Raptor and a Subaru WRX rally car.
Another technology shown off by DARPA also looked to improve the all-terrain ability of vehicles. Instead of raw traction, this system focuses on providing extreme suspension travel. How much exactly? Six feet, with 42 inches upward and 30 inches downward. By comparison, the 2017 Ford F-150 Raptor has 13.9 inches of travel.
Pratt & Miller developed this system, which it calls Multi-mode Extreme Travel Suspension (METS). Catchy. You can check out both the RWT and METS systems in the video below, plus several other technologies from the DARPA “Ground-X Vehicle Technologies” presentation.
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