Hello!!! This has always confused me since I was a kid.
How exactly do modern cars, or older steam locomotives, move when they have multiple tons of metal sitting on top of them? Like how does all of that mass sit on an axel and the axel is still able to rotate at high speeds? I’ve seen train axels/wheels in person and it’s basically a large metal rod with a wheel on each end. Does the force of the engine overcome the friction of all of that weight?
Thank you in advance!
For anyone else who is curious about this in the future, several of the comments below were super helpful. I was also able to find this video on YouTube as a visual demonstration based on the leads these guys provided!
https://youtu.be/lIEHscqWJAk
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Wheels make that slap of metal move like butter, ofc it will also require considerable amount of torque (spinning power) to move the wheels.
A normal car engine produces around 200 horse powers and a normal car weights around 2 tonnes. So imagine 200 horses pulling 2 tonnes of weight on wheels.
While the axle weights a lot, most of the weigh is in the engine bay. The axle is a very simple mechanism with a few gears designed to rotate at high speed. The purpose of the axel is to distribute torque to all the wheels and to operate as an Anti brake system, a system to distribute torque differently when you turn. Lets say you are turning right, the axle will deliver less torque to the driver side and more to the off side. This way the wheels wont slip even if there are pot holes. And also pot holes and films of water on the road, it does similar things.
Trains weights alot more so it would be logical to gives it a bigger engine.
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