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Radical New Car Tire


Humpty

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The tires bending like that are just like a shock absorber from just looking at it, and smacking curbs like that will typically damage a tire depending upon the speed they're hit at.

 

It actually looks rather brilliant on a technology side of things, and I bet Ford wishes they would've been in existence years ago so as to avoid all the SUV tire failures that caused rollovers and fatalities.

 

The only thing I don't like on them is cosmetic, the sidewalls are just flat out ugly to the point of looking stupid and goofy, but I suppose it's a work in progress. No flats, etc., I'd buy a set.

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The only thing I don't like on them is cosmetic, the sidewalls are just flat out ugly to the point of looking stupid and goofy, but I suppose it's a work in progress.

 

I'm guessing they'd have to have covered sides (of some sort), imagine getting a rock or stones stuck in the gaps, you'd have a very bumpy ride :huh:

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I'm guessing they'd have to have covered sides (of some sort), imagine getting a rock or stones stuck in the gaps, you'd have a very bumpy ride :huh:

 

They'd probably have to be made that way, you brought up an important point about rocks and stones. If one were to come flying out of that tire design at high speed it could cause horrific injuries, or even kill a person at the velocity cars travel at.

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my thoughts are that this is just to show people how they work, its actually quite interesting that they work without the sidewalls, most of the time on a demo they cut out a cross-section but you can't actually use the device after that. The one issue that came to mind was how do they deal with the different air pressures that current vehicles require in their tires, will they use different polymers to produce these different 'weighted' tires?? quite interesting anyway.

 

On a side note, We had one of those Ford Explorers that had the Firestone tires on it that caused all the rollovers, and let me just say this, never have we had a tire last sooo long. When they did the free replacement on them they gave us some Michellin tires which lasted just over half the time as the originals.

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The Michelin Tweel is (was? haven't heard about it for a while) actually in production for low speed/industrial/construction applications. They were open web because if you close the sides, the web can't flex. I understand the reason they were limited to low speed is they haven't solved the fact that they're very jittery and noisy at speed.

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They'd probably have to be made that way, you brought up an important point about rocks and stones. If one were to come flying out of that tire design at high speed it could cause horrific injuries, or even kill a person at the velocity cars travel at.

Well I don't really agree with either of you guys. Have either of you guys ever taken the guard off of a fan and tossed something at the blades? Chances are, you're not going to get anything, no matter how small, through the spinning blades. It's the same concept here. When you're driving at higher speeds (70kph, ~40mph), those things are going to "cover" the whole side of the tire.

 

Edit: And at certain speeds, I'd bet the centrifugal force on the tire will keep those things pretty stiff - meaning the quicker you drive, the more forceful your impacts.

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Edit: And at certain speeds, I'd bet the centrifugal force on the tire will keep those things pretty stiff - meaning the quicker you drive, the more forceful your impacts.

 

Who knows for sure, it's open to debate.

 

There'd still be the open gaps no matter how fast the vehicle is traveling and since stones/rocks aren't always flat they'd be more inclined to roll around.

 

Just one example is when watching race cars on t.v. that go into the gravel off the track and then make it back onto the track, there's rocks flying out of the wheels for a good enough amount of time, and race cars don't cruise about at 70 KPH/40 MPH.

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