Research of interrelations of soil properties as supporting surfaces for forest machinery movement

Wheeled and tracked vehicles are used in most technological processes of timber harvesting. The wheel and track units of machines interact with the support surfaces and soils of logging areas; the indicators of their interaction largely determine the technological efficiency, productivity and energy intensity, as well as the environmental safety of logging operations. Technological efficiency is determined by the passability of equipment, load capacity, speed of its movement through the cutting area, which affect the performance of machines, as well as fuel consumption during the route traffic. . Environmental safety is assessed by indicators of damage to the ground cover, impact on the root system of trees, compaction of soil, the depth of the formed track, the volume of emissions of combustion products into the atmosphere, directly related to fuel consumption. Previous studies have shown that the traction properties of wheel and track units and their impact on the support surfaces in practice can be estimated by the ratio of the actual pressure of the wheel and track units and the bearing capacity of the support surface. The pressure of the wheel and track units on the support surface is related to the parameters of the propeller, as well as the stress-related and strength properties of the deformable soil, the main of which are the modulus of general deformation and load-bearing capacity. Previously, it was found that these characteristics could be determined in the field by probing the forest soil with a manual cone penetrometer. The results of the study formed the basis for the method of operational control of forest soil properties. The goal is to develop the method by obtaining estimates of the relationship of the modulus of deformation, bearing capacity and cone index of various support surfaces, as well as by adding dependencies for evaluating the stress-related and strength properties of support surfaces by physical properties (humidity, density, consistency, porosity) and functions.