EURECA 2013 – Sport Shoes Traction Testing Device
Sport Shoes Traction Testing Device
Malvinder Singh1, Mr. Alexander Chee Hon Cheong2
School of Engineering,Taylor’s University,Malaysia , 2School of Engineering, Taylor’sUniversity, Malaysia
Abstract— Footwear traction is essential for sports like basketball
in order to perform swift changes of directions. A huge amount of
traction in basketball shoes is one of the factors that may
contribute to more non-contact injuries. Therefore the
experimenting of many different types of basketball sport shoes
traction on the same gaming surface will be tested. The aim of this
research is to study the traction of the basketball sport shoes on
one type of playing surface to mainly reduce injuries like ankle
injuries. A device is built to test the traction, and an experiment is
conducted to obtain particular results.
Keywords— Sport shoe traction, sport shoe testing device, traction
testing device, pneumatic traction testing, basketball shoe.
small amount of rotational traction will have much lower tendency for
foot injury because the amount of grip of the outsole to the ground is
less and easier for the athlete to make the next move.
Besides that, static and dynamic traction explains how it contacts
with the shoe outsole and the ground. Static traction is the traction that
is resisting for motion when there is zero movement between the shoe
outsole and the ground. For example, this type of movement resists the
first move of an athlete. Dynamic traction is the traction that is
resisting for motion during movement. For example, this type of
traction resist for the next movement after one movement is completed.
Thus building a device to test the amount of traction in a particular
brand or type of shoe outsole is very important to avoid injuries and to
ensure the amount of traction is sufficient and not too much [3].
1. Introduction
Traction is very important in sport shoes, but the right
amount of traction is more important and too much or too little will
cause injuries to athletes. Traction is the amount of maximum
frictional force that can be produced between surfaces without slipping
[1]. This project particularly is going to be tested only on basketball
shoes. The main factors for a traction is a fast start and stop
movements or performing a quick step in changing movement of
direction for the participation in today’s basketball games. Thus, in the
industry today there are many different outsole design which promise
an athlete to a huge amount of traction. However, excessive amount
traction can be equally dangerous and the factor for injuries.
The study on human movement is part of this project as it
deals with movement. Human movements relate to gait cycle. Gait
cycle is a medical term to describe the way we walk [2]. Every human
has a unique way of walking. A person’s gait can be affected by injury
or disease. This cycle describes the motion from initial placement of
the supporting heal on the ground to when the same heal contacts the
ground for the second time.
A device is needed to calculate the amount of traction in a
particular shoe depending on the type of surface or ground it is used
on..This device is running on pneumatic principles. This device is
quite simple to operate. It can be easily pushed anywhere around to
test. Any type of shoe can be tested on this device.
Figure 1 Schematic Diagram of a Generic Device for measuring
Translational Traction [4]
3. Research Methodology
Building a sport shoe traction testing device was studied.
There were many aspects that have been studied and it provided a lot
of insight in building a sport shoe traction testing device. The device
that is available in current market and information that is available is
mainly on football and soccer shoes. The similar concept was used to
build this device to test basketball shoes.
It can be seen that different turf and different amount of load
exerted by a players affects in the cause of injuries during sport
activities. Sometimes this injuries might lead athlete to lose their
ability to play sports either for a long time or lifelong. Thus the studies
on human gait cycles (human movement) were very vital to
understand the main aspects that are connected to building this sport
shoe traction testing device.
From all the studies and finding, solution to build a traction
testing device has been achieved. A clear understanding on how will
the sport shoe traction testing device works. It is simple and results
should be accurate.
In building a traction device it is important to have a
pressure regulator. This is because it independently regulates the force
going to the two actuator cylinders. These two actuator cylinders are
2. Theoretical Framework
2.1 Sport Shoes Traction Effect on Athlete
Traction of sport shoes is important for the performance and
safety of an athlete. Excessive amount of traction increases the risk of
foot fixation. Different amount of traction is required for different
types of shoes available in the market. The right amount of traction is
very important to avoid injuries during sport activities.
There are four main types of traction which is static,
dynamic, translational and rotational. The translational traction
basically is the amount of traction that is being resisted for the
particular shoe that is being tested to slide. A typical example is that,
high translational traction has more traction and low translational
traction has less traction, for an athlete. Traction that resists rotation
movement when any steps are taken is known as rotational movement.
When an athlete is involved in a sport game, having large amount of
rotational traction has a higher tendency for foot injury, whereas for
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EURECA 2013 – Sport Shoes Traction Testing Device
the vertical and the horizontal cylinders. The vertical cylinder forces to
the vertical motion to test the surface, whereas the horizontal cylinder
forces it to slide.
The vertical force is pressured externally. The force stays
constant during the test. The force amount can be seen from the air
pressure gauge. For horizontal force the pressure in converted into
force taking consideration of the pneumatic cylinder diameter and
stroke distance.
Resistance of shoe =
The amount of traction need to be significant, which is not too
much or too little to reduce the number of injuries that, happens during
basketball sport activities.
Slip resistance is calculated by horizontal force divided by the
vertical force. The ideal amount of slip resistance should be around 1.5
to 3.0.
Different types of shoes have different amount of traction, thus
shoes makes an important factor to avoid injuries. Different types of
outsole of a particular shoe is usually made for particular sports where
is has the right amount of traction on the particular ground where the
sport is being played.
The amount of human weight also plays a big different for shoe
traction as more weight can reduce the amount of traction in a
particular ground. Thus, for many times of sports there are different
shoes used that is suitable for the particular sport which in return will
reduce the cases of injuries to the athlete.
Horizontal force
Vertical force
6. Conclusions
In conclusion, traction testing device is important in order to
avoid injuries during sport activities. As too much or too little amount
of traction both can cause injuries or foot fixation which can lead to
other health or medical problems. The study on the background of
sport shoes and human movement is important in order to relate how
to avoid injuries. This traction device works on pneumatic principle.
Two pneumatic cylinders are connected for the vertical and horizontal
movement. The amount of traction can be calculated, the vertical force
divided by the horizontal force.
Acknowledgment
I am grateful and thankful to my supervisor Mr Alexander Chee Hon
Cheong who gave me full support and a lot of insight in making this
sport shoe traction testing device successful. This project would not
have been possible with the help of my supervisor. Besides that, I
would also like to thank my family, friends and other School of
Engineering, Taylor’s University staff that helped me indirectly in
making this project a success.
Figure 2 Sport Shoe Traction Testing Device
4. Results
References
Horizontal
Force(N)
277.33
Vertical Force(N)
Slip Resistance(N)
544.63
0.51
554.63
544.63
1.00
831.93
544.63
1.52
1109.26
544.63
2.04
[1] Thomas Grund, Veit Senner: Traction behavior of soccer shoe stud
designs under different game-relevant loading conditions. Technische
Unidersitat Munchen:2783-2788,2010
[2] Ashutosh Kharb, Vipin Saini, Y.K Jain, Surender Dhiman: A
review of gait cycle and its paramters. Deptt. Of ECE, BMIET,
Sonipat, Haryana, India: pp78-83,2011
[3] C.Alec Cheng, Ming-Chyuan Lin: Building an expert system for
the design of sport shoes. University of Missouri-Comulbi,pp.7277,1988
Table 1 Slip resistance results
5. Discussion
[4] ASTM International, Standard Test Methods for Traction
Characteristics of the Athlete Shoe-Sports Surface Interface, ASTM
International, USA:2011
From the results above it can be seen that the vertical force is
constant thorough out the experiment as it significant as human weight
during sport activities. As for the horizontal force it can be seen that it
is being changed. As this force signify the amount of force needed to
move the shoe.
[5] Martyn Shorten, Bret Hudson, Jennifer Himmelsbach: Shoesurface traction of conventional and in-filled synthetic turf football
surfaces. BioMechanica LLC, Portland, Oregon, USA
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