Michelin Rolls Out an Airless Tire That Will Be “Puncture-Proof”

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a27728995/michelin-airless-tire-uptis/

by Ultramanoid • 7 years ago

120 126 7 years ago

caranddriver.com

magwa101• 7 years ago

Drive with a screwdriver and pliers so you can pluck out all the rocks you pick up.

eganist4• 7 years ago

Can anyone hypothesize why there's no sidewall on these? Anything I come up with in my own mind I end up defeating.

Unrelated:

max load of 1102 pounds.

I have to assume this is per tire considering the Chevy Bolt weighs 3,600lbs but it's not clear from the article.

mensetmanusman2• 7 years ago

I’m guessing weight.

The added inertia would provide more shear stress in the rubber to get the tire accelerating. That could have a lifetime affect due to crazing in the polymer/fiber network (which can be especially prone to failure due to interfacial failure between the solid fibers and polymer matrix).

martin_henk• 7 years ago

i don't know why, but adding a wall seems like stiffening the whole wheel. secondly, manufacturing the same thing with walls seem kind of impossible.

elliekelly4• 7 years ago

I’m guessing because a sidewall on the tire wouldn’t be “airless”? And they’d have to check/monitor the air pressure of each of the “pockets” of air as temperature changes?

Full disclosure: I say this as someone who knows next to nothing about tires/tire pressure/cars in general. My tire pressure light has been on for at least three months now.

jfk13• 7 years ago

My tire pressure light has been on for at least three months now.

Maybe worth getting that checked?

jodrellblank• 7 years ago

My tire pressure light has been on for at least three months now.

From https://www.theaa.com/driving-advice/safety/tyre-pressures

"Under inflated tyres will increase stopping distances and affect your vehicle’s handling so that collisions are more likely; Under inflated tyres will flex more and get hotter, making sudden tyre failure – blowouts – more likely; Under or over inflation increases tyre wear so you’ll have to buy new tyres more often; Under inflation increases your tyre’s rolling resistance which means higher fuel consumption"

astura• 7 years ago

Please fill your tires, driving on under inflated tires is dangerous.

MisterTea• 7 years ago

I have to assume this is per tire considering the Chevy Bolt weighs 3,600lbs but it's not clear from the article.

Your assumption is correct. Tire load ratings are per tire.

Angostura2• 7 years ago

I assumed the sidewall had been cut away simply for the marketing images to show what is going on inside. I have no doubt the real thing will have a sidewall.

mhb• 7 years ago

Seems likely since they will want to keep snow, ice, debris, out. But it can just be of a material to prevent that.

jakear• 7 years ago

Article says “Michelin has introduced a .... [tire] that has no traditional sidewall”. So seems like it may not.

smugworth• 7 years ago

If the tire had closed sidewalls, you'd never know someone had the new tires without obtrusive labelling. Open sidewalls market themselves, not only do you see it's a different tire, you see it's an entirely different tire design that's relatively easy to comprehend the benefit of even if you know nothing about them.

swish_bob• 7 years ago

I'm not clear why people are leaping directly from "no traditional sidewall" to "no sidewall". It seems pretty likely that there will be a lightweight, porous, tough and possibly flexible sidewall just to keep rocks. etc out. Otherwise you're going to pick up sand, grit and rocks constantly.

mensetmanusman2• 7 years ago

This is awesome.

Our van had a tire slashed at a church parking lot that was renting space to the high school under construction. It didn’t collapse until after a 5 minute drive was completed when it was (thankfully) at rest. Exploding tires on the highway at 70 MPH aren’t fun to think about.

wmeredith• 7 years ago

At first glance I can’t tell how this overcomes the problems of the “Tweel” because it looks just like it (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tweel). Also made by Michelin, Tweels are really loud at high speed and they easily pick up stuff in their open sidewall structure leading to out of balance issues at speed-vibration. So they’ve mostly been deployed in low-speed, low-debris environments, like on forklifts in warehouses.

This looks like a different structural fin design, so maybe they’ve fixed the noise issue, but you still have an open sidewall to fill with mud, ice, rocks, etc...

eganist4• 7 years ago

Something advanced by the tire's lead evangelist at Michelin:

"If you have a load on the tire and you cut all the spokes at the bottom, you will see that nothing will change, demonstrating that the load is carried by the top of it, not by the under parts." Other airless tires, he said, often carry the load at the bottom of the tire, which is very inefficient and causes extra heating due to compression.

zrobotics2• 7 years ago

That just emphasizes the internal load distribution, it doesn't address concerns about mud/ice filling the sidewall. Sadly this is article is just a press release with very little technical information.

Tires like these already exist for industrial equipment, Michelin does need to address these very real concerns. I am also concerned about the ecological impacts, it appears the tire uses more rubber than conventional tires, the only way this isn't worse is if it is safely recappable. It may be, but again the article doesn't state so.

TickleSteve• 7 years ago

From your wiki link....

"Although it is acknowledged that the initial prototype automotive Tweel tires did demonstrate flaws with regard to noise and high speed vibration[5] and produced 5 percent more friction compared to a radial tire,[3] these early issues were resolved in subsequent prototypes, and current automotive Tweel prototype products have been shown to be well behaved and reliable."

eliben• 7 years ago

I wonder why they can't just close off the outer walls with rubber same as in regular tires.

masklinn• 7 years ago

I guess it would be very difficult to create the internal structure, and especially keep the internal structure separated from the sidewall (which would make the entire thing undesirably rigid)?

matt-attack• 7 years ago

Weight? Maybe they’re already too heavy with all those internal spokes. Sidewalls would just add more weight.

joenathanone• 7 years ago

I wonder what happens if you drive through mud, isn't it going to clog up the openings?

MrMember• 7 years ago

Ice and snow as well.

volume-scale2• 7 years ago

There's nothing that says the sidewalls have to be open celled.

pwinnski• 7 years ago

They'll be testing in Michigan, so they should be dealing with that issue pretty quickly!

dsfyu404ed4• 7 years ago

I suspect these are going to be much more sensitive to overloading than normal tires since they're gonna be specifically matched to the vehicle weight (unlike a pneumatic tire which can carry far more than vehicle but is simply inflated to a specific pressure for NVH/handling) you can't just air them up by a few pounds. You can't add more pressure to a non-pneumatic tire so it's simply going to deform more and generate more heat if you add more load. There's no good way around that.

One of the nice things about a pneumatic tire is that you can air down if you need low ground pressure. I guess that goes out the window too.

These will probably work really well in some use cases but barring some massive groundbreaking improvement I wouldn't expect to see these replacing conventional pneumatic tires over the next decade or two.

Edit: I'm talking about these tires in the general case, not specifically as they exist on a Bolt.

eganist4• 7 years ago

I suspect these are going to be much more sensitive to overloading than normal tires since they're gonna be specifically matched to the vehicle weight (unlike a pneumatic tire which can carry far more than vehicle but is simply inflated to a specific pressure for NVH/handling) you can't just air them up by a few pounds.

Interestingly, there's only 845lbs wiggle room on these tires as installed on the Chevy Bolt assuming the standard Bolt configuration at 3,563lbs and the carrying capacity of the tire at 1,102lbs. After accounting for your average American family of four (or just the weight of two men and two women) at 728lbs, you're left with 117lbs for the fifth person or belongings.

...so even if they're prototypes, I hope they've been over-engineered. That said, I want them to succeed.

dsfyu404ed4• 7 years ago

800lb is a perfectly normal capacity for anything built on a passenger car platform. Considering the bolt is a subcompact I'd actually say having ~800lb of "OEM approved"[0] capacity actually seems pretty good. I suspect most of that stems from having to build a beefier car to carry around those batteries 100% of the time while not having an unreasonably short service life for suspension components.

In showroom configuration 99.99% of vehicles are only spec'd with tires that barely exceed the GWVR.

That said, with a pneumatic tire you can just air it up higher than the OEM tells you to and you're good for more GVW at the expense of the tire wearing faster. Obviously you need to be reasonable about it but tires are pretty durable even over their stated weight rating as long as you don't run them hot (airing up reduces flex therefore reducing heat).

It will be very interesting to see if they come out in other sizes/capacities. They already make similar tires for off road use but they aren't suitable for road speeds (go figure)

[0] https://gm-volt.com/forum/showthread.php?276641-What-is-Bolt...

maxerickson3• 7 years ago

Small passenger cars tend to face a narrower range of loads and road conditions.

rob74• 7 years ago

Good observation, but I wonder how many drivers actually do that? Increase tire pressure when they are planning to travel with a higher load? I'm guessing under 5%, the others will just accept the higher tire wear and fuel consumption, or, more likely, be completely oblivious about it...

Aromasin• 7 years ago

I can imagine these being great for non-loading city vehicles. Something like a small hatchback generally only has a weight differential of few passengers, fuel, and some shopping bags. For something larger like a pick-up or 7-seater I'd be sceptical.

lm28469• 7 years ago

If you want to see something similar in action:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wAvxQfusWU

elliekelly4• 7 years ago

"If you have a load on the tire and you cut all the spokes at the bottom, you will see that nothing will change, demonstrating that the load is carried by the top of it, not by the under parts." Other airless tires, he said, often carry the load at the bottom of the tire, which is very inefficient and causes extra heating due to compression.

I’m a bit confused by this. Is the resin-embedded fiberglass that Uptis uses to make this possible in the tire or is this a new hub that makes the airless tire possible?

elliekelly4• 7 years ago

Too late for me to edit my comment but for anyone curious, I asked Michelin for clarification and it turns out the tire "spokes" are made from a composite rubber and resin embedded fiberglass. So it has the flexibility/movement of rubber but is high strength from the resin embedded fiberglass. It's on an aluminum hub just like any other tire.

pi-rat• 7 years ago

The main structure of the tire looks almost like voronoi 3d mesh. Do you think it's voronoi, or just looks similar?

I'm kinda surprised they didn't go for something like a gyroid mesh.

jstapels• 7 years ago

How would these be serviced? I would be surprised if conventional tire machines could mount/unmount these from wheels.

maxerickson3• 7 years ago

It's both parts, there's no separate wheel.

lqet• 7 years ago

Something like that already exists for bikes (English link in the comment below):

https://www.schwalbe.com/de/pressereader/weltneuheit-schwalb...

However, if I recall some reviews correctly, it is quite complicated to install.

glaberficken• 7 years ago

english link:

https://www.schwalbe.com/en/pressereader/schwalbes-world-fir...

jfengel• 7 years ago

I had foam-based bike tires 20 years ago, and they were quite awful. They cushion by flattening out on the bottom, creating an enormous rolling resistance. It was like pushing uphill everywhere.

This isn't quite the same, but in calling it the "first airless system" it sounds like they had done zero research on previous systems and have no idea what the potential problems are.

The new Michelin system is a rather different concept. I dunno if it will adapt to bike tires or not, but it would be great if it can.

martyvis• 7 years ago

Why would it take 5 years before they are production ready? It would seem if you are showing a product ready to test on real roads, you'd have to be much closer to shipping than that would indicate.

S_A_P• 7 years ago

Having a working prototype is not the same as having the infrastructure and supply chain in place to mass produce.

badfrog• 7 years ago

And there are probably (hopefully) a lot of safety certifications to go through after you start testing.

hprotagonist2• 7 years ago

https://www.sheldonbrown.com/gloss_aa-l.html

Airless tires have been obsolete for over a century, but crackpot "inventors" keep trying to bring them back. They are heavy and slow. They give a harsh ride and poor high-speed cornering on rough surfaces. They are also likely to cause wheel damage, due to their poor cushioning ability. A pneumatic tire uses all of the air in the whole tube as a shock absorber, while foam-type "airless" tires/tubes only use the air in the immediate area of impact...

leereeves• 7 years ago

The article acknowledges that:

Unlike past attempts at airless tires, Uptis functions the way other modern tires do and, Michelin claims, will provide a similar driving experience.

And I doubt Michelin is leaving this up to "crackpot inventors".

hprotagonist2• 7 years ago

I’ve seen the exact same design crash and burn three times from respectable companies in the bicycle and motorcycle world.

Hard ride, bad traction, pain in the royal butt to service or install...i don’t see these things changing just because the tire’s on a car now.

i predict we hear nothing else about this design.

gameswithgo• 7 years ago

As someone with a degree of practical expertise in Tires both automotive and cycling, who has seen this idea come and go a lot of times, I too remain fairly confident this tire will be fairly terrible compared to pneumatic tires, and useful only in fringe use cases where getting flats is a serious problem.

I will of course be happy to be wrong!

nwah1• 7 years ago

Because the wheel and tire would both be constructed out of fiberglass webbing, it seems like this could potentially reduce weight.

But whether it provides enough durability, traction, and a smooth riding experience is unclear. I'm rooting for them. Michelin definitely aren't crackpots.

orblivion• 7 years ago

I once saw a guy with (all according to his claim, albeit) a Penny-farthing from the mid to late 1800s. The original tire was there, all beaten up. It was just a strip of rubber.

macNchz• 7 years ago

They are also likely to cause wheel damage, due to their poor cushioning ability

Even regular run-flat tires seem to make wheel damage more likely. My car came with run flats and had multiple bent wheels over time, but I haven’t had any issues since I replaced them with normal tires a few years ago. Dramatically smoother and quieter ride as well. Lacking a spare tire I put some fix a flat and a 12v inflator in the trunk and hope for the best...

chungleong• 7 years ago

Should such tires be available to the general public? Many locations rely on tire shredders for perimeter security. These measure will become useless. As will spike strips used by law enforcement. How will police be able to stop fugitive vehicles equipped with puncture-proof tires? Some sort of remotely activated kill-switch will have to be mandated.

michaelmrose• 7 years ago

Neither consumers nor Consumer products should be primarily concerned with law enforcement convenience.

Car makers expertise at making cars is often pretty bad their expertise with electronics and software security is hilariously bad.

A universal remote kill switch is a very bad idea especially in response to a tire that might be in production for a tiny fraction of cars 5 years from now and with a wildly successful and unlikely uptake could be pervasive in merely decades.

Given motivation I'm sure people can probably figure out a low tech solution that does not involve figuring out how to fit all cars going forward with a backdoor that will almost certainly be exploited.

For example perhaps something could damage or foul the wheel or clamp onto it.

hirundo2• 7 years ago

Theoretically, the tread life for the Uptis is the same as a standard tire

Imagine the disaster a much longer tread life on this tire would be to Michelin and tire shops. Even if Michelin could maintain their profit with proportionately higher prices, tire shops would be hammered by a long life tire.

I'm not claiming that such a tread is out there and being suppressed. But if it were a plausible but expensive engineering problem there would be a great incentive, especially by market leaders like Michelin, not to pursue it.

But wouldn't it be wonderful to buy a car with tires that are expected to last as long as the rest of the car. I can dream.

snazz• 7 years ago

Sounds like a wonderful market opportunity for a “disruptive” startup. As much as I dislike Tesla for other reasons, building tires that last for the life of the car would probably be good for their bottom line.

mc326• 7 years ago

Yep, that would be the digital sensor vs analog film scenario all over again.

Kodak lost out (even though they were one of the first with quality high resolution sensors) because they didn’t want to cannibalizes and threaten their cash cow (and legacy or patrimony).

sschueller• 7 years ago

I don't think it would have such a large impact since many tires get destroyed before their tread is up. Punktures and curbing hapens a lot especially in cities with poorly maintained pavements which is saddly quite common.

Then you have that many cars now want you to replace at minimum 2 tires and not just the one that has been punctured.

mc326• 7 years ago

Whatever happened to re-vulcanizing tires? Trucks and tractors still have their worn treads re-vulcanized. Why not private autos? Seems it would be friendlier to the pocket (not having to buy a whole new set) and friendlier to the environment...

foepys• 7 years ago

It would also be environmentally smart to have such a tire. The abrasion of current tires is creating very, very small rubber particles that are just flying around with the wind. Creating waste in every corner of the world.

agumonkey• 7 years ago

A year ago or so I read a webpage about car tires. The guy claimed that some high ranked Michelin guy said in the 80s "we can make infinite tires right now, why would we do that ?". :)

saalweachter2• 7 years ago

This is like, the perfect internet version of "my girlfriend's cousin's friend's aunt said" stories.

If intentional, bravo.

0xDEFC0DE• 7 years ago

It doesn't seem too difficult to go from tire shop to regular car maintenance shop. Michelin would care less about manufacturing tires and more about R&D, e.g. Can you scale the Uptis design up to tractors and larger sized wheels? The incentive here for Michelin is also being an initial leader in the new market if an airless tire fad catches on and the product is good.

matwood• 7 years ago

It doesn't seem too difficult to go from tire shop to regular car maintenance shop.

At least locally this has already happened. I just got new tires for my truck at a place named Tire something or other. Since I was there I got an oil change. I also have a leaky head gasket (110k miles on the truck) they said they could fix it then or I could just do it at my next oil change.

chrisseaton2• 7 years ago

tire shops

Do you get shops in the US that do nothing but tyres?

I think you also have shops that just do oil changes?

Why split all these jobs up? In the UK I take my car to one shop, once a year, and they do it all in a couple of hours.

SolaceQuantum• 7 years ago

It depends on the shop. A tire shop will have more versaility, availability, and product to browse. There's places that only do inspections/minor stuff like oil changes, wiper replacements, meter checking, etc. There's other places that only do collision damage. And others that specialize in paints and designs. There are definitely do-it-all places, but they will take a wait as they have specialty equipment delivered to them/shipped to them as needed. For example, a tire replacement at a do-it-all shop took well over an hour for them just to get the tires in the shop to replace on my car.

bluGill3• 7 years ago

Because the jobs don't need to be done at the same time or by the same people. Specialization is a very useful way to get something faster better AND cheaper.

Oil changes places are setup to make oil changes fast and easy: there is a pit in the floor, and someone in there at all times. When you pull for your oil change he has the right wrench on your engine almost before you turn it off, and is only waiting for "go" to start letting the oil out. The guy on top is meanwhile looking up the oil filter (which they have in stock: they turn inventory fast enough that accountants don't worry about this cost) and how much oil to put in. When the oil plug is replaced below the guy on top has a machine programmed to put the right amount of the right oil in. The result is they can do your oil change in 10 minutes with 2 low skill employees and they make less mistakes since the machines are programmed to prevent them.

Compare to your mechanic: he needs to jack your car up (he has a power lift not a pit), then move the drain pan into place. Then one the lower end is done jack it down, call the warehouse to deliver the right filter for your car, then look up how much oil to put in and open the cans and count. In the end your mechanic ends up spending more man hours than the oil change place and is more likely to make a mistake because less is automated. Your mechanic is also more expensive because he knows how to do other work and has tools for that, you pay for all those tools and knowledge even if you don't use it.

That pit in the oil change place is very dangerous (exhaust buildup, people falling in), engineers have spent significant effort figuring out how to make then safe. That pit is also expensive, if use it for 30 oil changes a day, 6 days a week, for 10 years the cost is pretty cheap per use. If you are a mechanic working on general repair not only is a lift cheaper and safer, the ability to position the car at any height make it more useful: if you have a both you will often choose the lift making the cost of the pit something that is amortized over less uses.

Similar applies to tire changes: they need some expensive specialized equipment that your mechanic isn't using but still needs to pay for. The tire change place has more tire customers to amortize this with.

Note that the above specialization works because oil changes are tire changes are common enough that it is worth the effort to make it work. Your town doesn't need to be very big for there to be enough cars to support many specialized oil change and tire shops. This quantity of shops means that engineers who design specialized tools have a large number of potential customers to split the R&D cost between making the costs lower. Tires and oil are all similar enough between cars that one machine can handle most.

As we get out of the common repairs we get to one off: most engines don't need a head gasket change anymore, for 200 million dollars I can design a special tool to do the job much faster: labor might only be $20, but your share of the tool R&D is $1 million dollars since only 100 people will replace the head gasket for that type of engine. Or you can pay a mechanic to do it without the tool, your labor is $800 but not special machine to pay for. Of course if your engine turns out to have a common problem things will change: mechanics will develop tricks to do the job faster, maybe some tools will be made, but it will probably never get as cheap as the machine I envisioned.

SmellyGeekBoy• 7 years ago

Huh? I live in the UK and there are two "tyre shops" in my small rural town that do nothing but tyres. It's not a strange concept.

gitgud2• 7 years ago

I don't understand this argument. It's a conspiracy similar to the suppressed cancer cure. It sounds reasonable at first glance but when you break it down it doesn't make sense.

Any company, including the market leaders would instantly make billions with a cheap long lasting tire and would render all competitors as obsolete. All other tires would become buggy whips in comparison...

So, why would they suppress that?

hirundo2• 7 years ago

If Michelin could produce a tire that lasted 10x as long, they probably could not sell it for 10x the price. They probably can't increase their market share by 10x either to make up for it. So while making such a tire might still be a winner for them, it isn't crystal clear.

It would be a more obvious good deal for a smaller tire maker who has more market share to gain. But they're less capable of sustaining a huge R&D budget. I just hope the solution isn't that expensive.

mc326• 7 years ago

I mentioned this downthread, but a classical example is Kodak missing out on the digital revolution in cameras.

They had a technological lead, but were afraid to cannibalize and threaten their cash cow (film). In the meantime others with less to lose, jumped in and eventually took over the market and Kodak became a shell of its former self. Point being, it's not unheard of for companies to be slow to adjust to a new realization.

SketchySeaBeast2• 7 years ago

Tire shops will still charge for the winter changeout and whatever maintenance people have been delaying with it.

I'm honestly happy if they last the same length, as long as I never need to worry about running on a flat - even just getting the damned tired pressure sensors calibrated correctly turns into a day or two of effort.

bluedino3• 7 years ago

Discount tire does it for free and will even store your winter tires.

sokoloff2• 7 years ago

There is a tradeoff between traction and (to a lesser extent) ride quality versus treadwear.

Long treadwear tires tend to have terrible traction qualities as compared to softer tires. This is obviously true in motorsports (and is a major strategy component in Formula One), but is also noticeable on road cars. It's not just sports cars and "racer wannabees", but handling traction is a safety issue at the limit. For winter tires, you typically need a softer and more compliant compound as well.

You could make tires out of something closer to cast iron that would wear incredibly long but have terrible traction and ride.

dsfyu404ed4• 7 years ago

There is a tradeoff between traction and (to a lesser extent) ride quality versus treadwear.

Exactly.

If you throw load range E truck tires on your compact SUV they will last until they dry rot, so a decade or so. People buy milsurp Goodyear MTRs and run them on pickups/SUVs and they last practically forever on lighter vehicles. Neither of these will do good things for handling though.

The tire OEMs could make a tire that lasted 100k and provide "tolerable" handling in normal conditions if they wanted. They don't want to because in this day and age anything that obviously trades safety for reduced cost is basically a non-starter and they don't want to get sued into oblivion.

You could make tires out of something closer to cast iron that would wear incredibly long but have terrible traction and ride.

"sheepsfoot wheels" is the term you're looking for.

dougmwne• 7 years ago

I apologize in advance for the armchair engineering, but from a basic knowledge of material science, everlasting tires probably aren't practical. The tire needs to be soft and grippy in order to be safe on the road. Soft things will be worn down by harder things. So to keep the tire soft enough to be safe, you would need to add more material. But lots of mass on the outer circumference of a wheel would have negative implications for performance and fuel efficiency.

And besides, modern tires last 50k miles. That's twice around the planet by friction force. That's not enough of an engineering marvel for you folks?

Shivetya• 7 years ago

EVs will be a seismic disruption of the industry to the point that worrying about tire life will be the least of the concerns.

With regards to these tire replacements, the questions that occurred with previous look a likes are still on my mind. How do they keep the open and compressible areas free of debris, if not snow during those months, and what effect does the debris that are not dislodged have longevity and safety?

Since sidewalls impart a lot of strength how do these tires perform during harsh maneuvers. Are they strong enough side wall wise for racing? Some tread compounds are sticky enough on production tires to allow cars to pull more than 1g forces laterally.

Even if they reduce the need to replace them as often, there are already tires that pull in excess of fifty thousand miles, I doubt they will be that radical. The softer summer compounds are not being discussed here and those are popular on many sports cars and non traditional sport vehicles

NikolaNovak• 7 years ago

Today, you can buy tires in varies tread wear rating. You CAN buy tires which will last you a really long time; their traction though will be correspondingly lower.

Tire design (and purchase, for an informed consumer) is a compromise between price, grip, wear, and conditions (temperature, rain/snow/mud/etc).

My friend buys tires that last him ~7+ years, which for him is a lifetime of the vehicle. But if a kid ever jumps in front us on the street, I'll rather be in my summer performance tires that last me ~3 years (or less if I have fun:).

toss1• 7 years ago

Very extended treadlife is definitely possible.

The problem is that you will not like the tradeoffs.

This is vastly oversimplifying, but the overall tradeoff is grip vs durability.

You get a very grippy tire made for racing in series that mandate street tires, and these will typically have both a very sticky compound and low tread depth. They perform great, but may last less than 15K miles of street use (or less than 20 miles on the racetrack).

On the other end, you can get what are essentially hockey pucks that'll last a very long time in normal highway use.

Depending on what you want to optimize for, you can start with several ratings on the tires themselves. Tire Rack has a great guide here [1] on treadwear and traction grades. It is a good place to start, and then you should always seek more detailed knowledge from people with direct field experience, as the ratings can be a bit games (e.g., you'd want to get some kind of AAA-traction rated tire for an autocross or track day, but getting the best one for your car, driving style and that event it'd be best to also talk to/read articles by people who've been there & done that)

[1]https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=...

shusson• 7 years ago

It's really nice to see someone actually re-invent the wheel.

growlist• 7 years ago

Wow. That's probably millions more jobs gone then for tyre shops, though obviously there will be a slow switchover.

josefresco• 7 years ago

I had "run flats" on a Honda minivan years ago. When it came time to replace them, I was presented with the option of new run flats for $800+, or traditional tires for less than half that. If the replacement cost of these tires is exorbitant, they will fail in the marketplace.

chrismeller• 7 years ago

That’s hardly the only factor, though. How long do they last? Is getting a flat something that happens to you on a regular basis? What about savings from canceling your AAA membership and the loss of work time waiting on them? Are they as uncomfortable as they used to be?

In 20 years of driving I can count on one hand how many times I’ve gotten a flat of any kind and none of them were bad enough that I had to immediately pull over. It’s also not like I only drive 5 miles a day, I easily beat the national average in regular usage and have taken multiple 2+ month long road trips covering 10k miles at a time.

For me the value just isn’t there, but I suppose there are people who have had dozens of flats? I mean they have to exist for a reason, right?

nimbius2• 7 years ago

speaking as an automotive mechanic for a chain of small midwest shops, this technology has existed for almost a century. What the article should specify is that Michelin intends to offer a motor vehicle version of this technology, which I think is probably going to be disaster for a few reasons:

1. weight. anything thats supposed to handle interstate speeds and offer comfort is going to be heavy as it will need to be durable. id be surprised if these tweels show up with the longevity of a standard all-weather radial. Id be even more surprised if drivers dont pull into the service station for more esoteric repairs like CV joints, brakes or idler/pitman assembly changeouts as this is common in vehicles that upgrade to more rugged tires.

2. partial failure. Most people dont want to spend money on a new tire if its 40% worn and a hole or cut is in the tread. Typically a bubblegum type or kevlar patch is applied for $30 to the tire, which keeps it rolling intil its worn enough to replace. How do you repair a tweel thats received curb strike damage or a sharp object?

For those who have pointed out, yes, fork trucks and fork lifts commonly use solid tires, but thats largely due to how they work. Many forklifts can hoist in excess of 40 tons, so it makes sense to have a tire that doesnt readily compress. Its why big trucks have to have more tubeless tires for larger loads. The plastic or rubber tires on forklifts also have a quick re-tread option. The tires often dont even need to be removed, as they have more treads that can be created by pulling out zip-tie like spacers in the worn tread. other models use a hot-iron type re-treader. that being said, forklift tires are very heavy and so are the wheels, and neither last very long at full-speed.

maxerickson3• 7 years ago

If they are deploying it on some subset of 1 small car in 5 years, it probably won't be anything worse than a boondoggle.

tempguy9999• 7 years ago

The [forklift] tires often dont even need to be removed, as they have more treads that can be created by pulling out zip-tie like spacers in the worn tread

Wow, that's clever. But it does make me ask, tread is AFAUI for dealing with water on the ground, and I guess also when the vehicle's going at speed.

Forklifts AFAIK operate mainly indoors, and even then they never get up to any speed that I've ever seen, so why treads at all?

nimbius2• 7 years ago

forklifts sometimes exit warehouses and load flatbed trucks, not to mention some manufacturing facilities may have areas with slick floors or areas where rain may reach (near the docks mainly) so tread is generally provided. speaking from experience, the tread can help with gravel patches too.

you can order treadless tires as well.

tomcam• 7 years ago

I love all your posts. Please harvest the email address in my profile in case you ever start a blog.

WorldMaker• 7 years ago

Starting the testing with EVs seems to imply that they feel they have a solution for weight, I would presume, because EV weight management is a huge focus.

(Weight is much more obviously and directly influential in an EV's mpkwh/mpge than in an ICE vehicle's mpg. Brags about weight savings are huge in the EV sector, including cars advertising even the rolling weights of their tires versus their competitors.)

kazinator• 7 years ago

Michelin's new Unique Puncture-Proof Tire System (Uptis) does away with one of the defining aspects of tires as we've known them for more than 100 years: the air inside.

Absolute nonsense. Airless tires have been around for about that long also. I've seen airless motorcycle tires from circa 1920 in a museum: they looked a lot like that picture of the new one: basic hub shapes with lateral voids in them.

They are in use currently; I've seen them from time to time over the years on various earth-moving equipment around town.

The idea of airless tires for general motorist use gets periodically trotted out by snake oil salesmen as some new revolutionary thing that will take over the industry.

Pneumatic tires have superior performance because the entire volume of air around the wheel provides the suspension and shock absorption, rather than just the compression of a small amount of material around the contact patch.

exabrial• 7 years ago

Curious if this adds to the unsprung weight of the suspension component or not

masonic• 7 years ago

The French card game Mille Bornes used the name "Puncture-Proof" (English version) for its safety card to make one invulnerable to flat tires.

amriksohata• 7 years ago

They could have made this a long time ago but the industry backed by giants like Goodyear, Dunlop, pirelli etc would lose out on their business model of replacement tyres so wouldn't push it. Similar thing happened to the electric car in the 90s California had quite a few, but the oil industry killed them off, watch the programme "who killed the electric car"

Michelin Rolls Out an Airless Tire That Will Be “Puncture-Proof”

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