A Novel Load Cell-Supported Research Platform to Measure Vertical and Horizontal Motion of a Horse’s Centre of Mass During Trailer Transport.

The research presented in this paper focuses on developing a platform that measures the movement of a horse’s center of mass during transportation. The aim is to identify additional work imposed on horses during transport, which would assist in designing smart transport systems ensuring lesser stress for horses.

Objective and Methodology

• The main objective of this study was to understand and quantify the additional physical stress and workload imposed on horses during transportation and use this information to design better transportation systems.
• To fulfill this objective, a custom two-horse trailer was built which was fixed with 24 shearbeam load cells. These cells were used to measure both the vertical load exerted by each horse and its horizontal motion.
• The trailer was driven on a 56 km trip, traversing both rural and urban roads, with two horses. The load data was collected continuously throughout the trip (lasting 58 minutes) at a sampling rate of 100 Hz. This data was then filtered using a Butterworth low-pass filter with a cut-off frequency of 5 Hz.

Calculations and Measurements

• Vertical acceleration was computed, allowing the researchers to count the sign reversals (tallies which express changes in the acceleration’s direction) in the acceleration signal.
• The vertical displacement was calculated using the fundamental frequency of the acceleration data. Negative displacements were then made absolute, and all displacements were added to calculate the total vertical motion.
• The vertical work done was computed by multiplying the force by the displacement measures, representing the total energy required for the upward and downward movements.
• Horizontal motion was quantified by averaging the changing position of the center of pressure every second, and then adding up the displacements.

Results

• The absolute vertical displacement for the two horses was found to be 69.55 m and 97.56 m respectively.
• Aside from the work done merely by standing, the vertical work done in response to vibration was deduced to be 322.4 kJ and 443.2 kJ.
• The horizontal excursion or movement was recorded as 227.1 m and 243.0 m for each horse.
• The research is a pioneering attempt to quantify the additional workload on animals during transport, essentials in the future design of smart transport vehicles aiming to minimize stress to horses.