I am not gonna explain in detail on what is a tire, what’s it made of, its composition, or its vast and wide applications. However, I am gonna begin with a few simple questions to get started:
Tire (Tyre)…WTH?
Well, these things are all around us. We always see it everyday; some might find it cool and some just never think about it and some just don’t even care; as long as it works.
Tires are on cars. Tires are on bikes, tires are on lorries, tires are also on trains and airplanes. This post is just gonna concentrate on tires that are made from rubber. These rubber tires are usually not made from 100% organic or agriculturally produced rubber as they has been engineered to cater for man-made regulations and other heavy engineered jargon that I might not even bothered to know. What they do is for easy movement for our vehicles on the road or in a technical way to put it : a point of contact between the surface of the road and the body of our vehicle.
Basically design of a tire we always see today has its treads, tubing & rims..
So…why tire?
Y? Just feel like writing it I guess..jap…just read about something cool I think. Something bout airless tires.
k..airless tire? WTH?
Airless tire has already in existence for quite a while. Toddler’s tricycles or children bicycles usually have em. Only recently major tire manufactures (michellin, bridgestone etc.) start putting in airless tire on bigger vehicle that we usually drive on.
Airless tire are basically tires that has no tubing; meaning you don’t have to inflate it or check for its pressure time to time.
Seems like the small bikes have already used it for sometimes how come only now they are putting it on cars?
Having an airless tire would be awesome~ No more tire pressure maintenance; no more puncture problems, your tire can get run over by hundred nails and still survive and no more patches on those nasty leaks.
But…
Airless tire are made of flexible trusses (spokes); and these spokes expands and contracts if it pass through an uneven surface. Frequent contraction and expansion leads to heating and annoying noise, especially if it is driven at high speeds.
Thus in Tweel (michellin’s airless tire) its focus group are for heavy machinery and military vehicles; they only move in slow to mid velocity range.
But.. a recent breakthrough in this airless tire is that Bridgestone has introduced a concept airless tire that is designed for normal consumer use. Find it all about it here.
So..all in all a simple thing that we always take for granted has evolved in its own direction and its story alone has a cool beginning and journey…
