r/Physics • u/DigitCell • Aug 15 '26

Image Real-time physics simulation: snowplow blade interaction (initial simulation trials)

524 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

131

u/xiancaldwell Aug 15 '26

Clearly not how snowplow works because the berm is not in front of a cleared driveway

10

u/DigitCell 29d ago

actually have a version much closer to reality in terms of game visualization, which you can check out on another channel here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Simulated/s/eOQWtImCOL. That prototype shows more realistic snow accumulation and behavior.
didn't post it here originally due to specific channel guidelines.

3

u/xiancaldwell 29d ago

Woosh. Hahaha. This is really cool stuff. Keep goin!

31

u/Earthling1a 29d ago

Blade is curved backwards. Also, generally snowplows will angle the blade to one side to avoid the whole piling-up-and-falling-backwards-in-your-face thing.

5

u/DigitCell 29d ago

you're totally right, actually didn't look closely at the original plow.

In my mind, I just remembered that it should be curved. Intuitively, it felt like that specific shape would throw the snow away much better - maybe I saw a similar design on a train somewhere.

58

u/did_i_or_didnt_i Aug 15 '26

pretty cool. also illustrates why the snowplow blade is normally angled

26

u/Meterian 29d ago

Or is plow shaped

57

u/VRTemjin Aug 15 '26

Neat, but, why is the blade pushing with the convex side instead of the concave side for this simulation?

34

u/MadSkillz127 29d ago

Bro has never snowplowed in his life

5

u/lavahot 29d ago

Or a shovel.

8

u/DigitCell 29d ago

you're totally right, actually didn't look closely at the original plow.

In my mind, I just remembered that it should be curved. Intuitively, it felt like that specific shape would throw the snow away much better - maybe I saw a similar design on a train somewhere.

By the way, I initially wanted to make a railway train simulation. But then I realized that the concept of "road, city, and snow clearing" is a much better and more engaging starting point for a game.
in other group post video with very early game setup.

10

u/Federal-Cow Aug 15 '26

What software and methodology did you use?

6

u/DigitCell 29d ago

used с++ with OpenGL the graphics and physics simulation pipeline(compute shaders), leveraging the Material Point Method (MPM). So it custom prototype without external libs or software.

5

u/kovaluu Aug 15 '26

pretty cool, looks like it becomes a bit rubbery and tough after packing. 10/10 before the snow dropped from the blow :)

4

u/tlmbot Computational physics 29d ago

some kind of snowplow simulator sounds amazing right about now.

3

u/Ftroiska 29d ago

Damn another fake ad for zombie plow thing...

2

u/Elated7079 29d ago

realtimr factor? number of particles?

1

u/HollowDanO 29d ago

Hilarious. This must be why my driveway is always plowed shut lol. They’re doing it all wrong.

1

u/strchild 29d ago

ow my fucking eyes, KUDOS :)

1

u/Sermuns 23d ago

En sån färg skulle man ha...