The Future of Tires – Bridgestone Airless Eco Tires
Tim Esterdahl | Dec 21, 2011 | Comments 7
Recently, Bridgestone demonstrated a new prototype tire that requires requires no air and is supposed to be greener to make and recycle.
Bridgestone Airless Eco-Tires has spokes that take the place of air making them into true non-flat tires.
While this new tire looks normal from a distance, its wheel tread is actually a honeycomb of curved spokes. These spokes are made up of reusable and recyclable materials. This lets the tires be recycled more easily than current traditional tires, reducing the number of tires that end up in landfills.
The new tire also claims to be safer than a traditional tire. Since this tire doesn’t rely on air pressure, it could be less prone to punctures and holes than traditional tires. Its smaller rims may also make a car safer in a crash than traditional tires would.
This new tire has been unveiled shortly after the advances in tire technology that have come about as the result of the wars in the Middle East. The need to improve the safety of the tires on armored vehicles has produced several different advances in tire technology.
Until recently, the rubber and other materials used to support armored vehicles wasn’t strong enough to withstand the forces created by a roadside bomb. Fortunately, there have been improvements in the field of run-flat tire technology. Resilient Technologies has used this technology to create the Non-Pneumatic Tire. The tire uses a plastic honeycomb that is wrapped in a rubber tread, making it immune to most punctures.
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Filed Under: Tundra Wheels and Tires
Smaller rims means it won’t fit the Tundra brake system. I can omagine the price on these also. Last month I spent $700 on a new set of Duelers. Now if these are reasonably close and can get over 60k miles then we can look into those tires.
I agree about prices. Those look like they will be really expensive to replace. Back to the old days of recaps!!
They might want to consider doing some testing in snow and ice too. Those don’t look like they would work very well.
Can I get that in white walls?
LOL. I’m sure they can make them.
-Tim
There would still be issues to overcome with this design on automobiles. With conventional tyres you adjust tyre pressure according to load. There is a trade-off between grip,wear and rolling resistance. Will be interesting to see how they account for this requirement.
Amazing , there would still be issues to overcome with this design on automobiles. with conventional tyres you adjust tyre pressure according to load. There is a trade-off between grip,wear and rolling resistance. Will be interesting to see how they account for this requirement.
Bridgestone’s airless tires have a deeper structure of plastic ribs than either of the other two approaches, and it has a higher aspect ratio as well.