Tyre Supplier Wanted for F1

Tenders are invited for supply of tyres to high tech automotive company.

Previous inscrutable supplier of past 13 years, exclusive supplier past three, willing to pass on tales of heartaches and drama to successful tenderer at the conclusion of the 2010 season.

Apply – if you’re rich, resourceful, and only slightly demented – to:

Bernie Egglestone PLC -F1 cars Division

(Bridgestone Firestone have announced that they are relinquishing their role as the only tyre supplier to Formula 1 Racing at the end of the 2010 season.)

P.S. The ad is a spoof.

Good Tyres, Bad Tyres, What’s the Difference anyway?

Because so much of the detail of a tyre is hidden from view, and it doesn’t mean much to the average tyre buyer anyway, the customer feels quite entitled to ask “Why does this tyre cost more than that tyre, and what does the difference mean to me anyway?”

Because more often than not, the tyre is presented in a vertical stack alongside other tyres, the salesperson is quite likely to launch into a comparison of tread and buttress design and width, tread pattern design, accompanied by claims of superior mileage, roadholding, reliability, and “it’s on special this week only” sales presentation. The reason is that either the customer can see these things for themselves, or can conceptualise, or are prepared to accept because the salesman obviously knows more than they do.

The question remains though – “why does this tyre cost more than that tyre?” It’s a valid question from the customer’s point of view. Why do some tyres cost more than others, and is it worth it to buy the more expensive tyre?

So start with “how recent is the design?” Most new tyre designs (sizes, patterns, constructions) are brought into production to meet the requirements of the design engineers of new cars. If they didn’t ask for particular improved tyre attributes, then the design process would stagnate. They drive the improvements, to meet design parameters that they want to incorporate in their new car design. This process goes on worldwide, all the time.

The tyre company, needing their business, designs, qualifies, tests extensively, government certifies their new tyre design, and submit prototypes to the car company for evaluation on their new design car. To this stage, this has cost a great deal of money in technical resources, tooling costs, mould manufacture, and qualifying testing. Then they wait while the car company engineers evaluate their tyres against others from competing tyre companies. So there is no certainty that these prototype tyres will ever see enough of a production run to amortise their development costs.

Remember, each new car has at least 4 new tyres, possibly 5.

So hurrah, at last the car company accepts the tyre for production, and contracts for supply at a particular rate at 12 hour’s notice is arranged, at a price that is barely adequate.

Then, after two to three years, replacement tyres are required by the car buyer from a retail tyre store, in competition with tyres from all over the world in the same size. This is possible because of currency alignments, and because tyres are all made to conform to the same standards regarding size dimensions, speed and load carrying capacity.

But there emerge major differences in appearance, because the car engineers may have specified a quiet riding tyre for a saloon, whereas more eye-appealing tyres from say Europe in the same size may have been designed for a more sporty vehicle; or advertising campaigns, consumer reviews may influence both retailer and buyer; the reputation of the brand definitely carries weight; word of mouth approval; bulk package deals from wholesaler to the retailer; or simply the skill of the salesman in influencing the customer’s choice, based on questioning the customer as to the application of the tyre. Always in the background, is the appeal of low price.

Another 3 years on, another 60000 kilometres, time’s moved on, probably the car’s changed hands, the pattern is no longer available (the moulds do wear out), fashion has changed, tooling costs have been recovered, so the price of the product has been lowered to meet competition and retain market share. Besides, 18 inch wheels have superseded 15 inch- that wasn’t so long ago, was it! Your once newly developed tyre has now become the price leader into the tyre shop so that hopefully you will buy something better, more modern, better performing, more costly.

Tyres are all fat and black, look the same from the outside, they’re almost all truly round these days, and the detail of the construction differences are inside the casing. However, small differences inside add up to small improvements in braking, handling, cornering, steering response (lane changing ability), quietness, and harshness over concrete road joins, durability under high speed/high load conditions, and other measurable improvements. All carry a cost, improvements are small, but when it comes to the crunch, may make a difference to your comfort or wellbeing. Just the design of the tread pattern, the scrambling of the tread elements to break up the noise generated, can add considerably to the cost of the mould. Then you have to have the I.T. expertise to be able to produce the noises the pattern makes on a computer first.

If you buy a bad tyre, it will be with you for a long time.

Tread life isn’t the be all and end all. A survey of Australian motorists some years ago showed that the quality most desired in a tyre was the ability to stop, and handle, in the wet. Perhaps the average motorist is more discerning than they are given credit for!

If you would like to know more, have a look at the blog on www.carbonblack.com.au, and the “All About Tyres” section too.

Goodyear Wingfoot teams with Aussie Lightfoots

Helen and John Taylor, an Australian couple who have made a speciality of setting records for low fuel consumption in the USA, have done it again.

Converting their miles per American gallon to litres per hundred kilometres yields an astonishing 4.155 litres /100 km in their 2009 Volkswagen Jetta diesel.
This time they were riding on Goodyear Fuel Max tyres, and improved on their 2008 figure by a further 15.4%!

This consumption is more fuel-efficient than the most popular hybrid, and shows what can be done with modern diesel technology, careful preparation and fuel saving driving techniques.

Follow this link to learn more.

So how do they do it? Tyres obviously play a part, since Goodyear sponsored their 9000 mile circuit of the States. We are constantly told to maintain high air pressures if fuel savings are desired, but what are the limits? A tyre usually absorbs around 2 KW just rolling around under load at 120 km/h.

The safe maximum pressure of a tyre is shown on the sidewall, and for a passenger tyre is in the 36 (Standard Load)- 42 (Extra Load) p.s.i. range. It will not burst at 43 p.s.i., but a maximum is specified to maintain a margin of safety for tyre abuse such as potholes and rough edges. So economy drivers go to the limit, or beyond. A tyre with 15 p.s.i. pressure pulls nearly twice the rolling resistance as the same tyre at 33 p.s.i. at 120 km/h, the higher pressure giving a fuel consumption improvement of about 4%. Steel belt radials have the lowest rolling resistance, too.

Staying with tyre design, a narrow tread width, shallow tread pattern, and a rounded tread arc radius all contribute to lower rolling resistance, and with specially compounded tread rubber it is possible to design a tyre to maximise the reduction in a tyre’s contribution to fuel consumption.

Preparation of the vehicle using low friction lubricants, a well run-in engine, diesel fuel designed to give “more bang for the buck”, and other tricks of the trade are also used, such as refuelling at low ambient temperatures, like the middle of the night.

But driver’s skills are required to get good figures. Feather-footing, low top speeds, shift points carefully calibrated, travelling when wind speeds are low, smooth car surface with no unnecessary projections, climbing hills carefully (just making it over the top), and no air-conditioning are techniques used. Depending on the rules of the contest, in most cases coasting downhill, and drafting, is prohibited. In certified fuel economy runs conducted in Australia, an independent observer travels in the car to prevent this.

Want to know more on the tyre angle? In our All About Tyres section you will find Green Tyres are Black, David’s ten tyre tips, and Exploding Cylinders which will expand on rolling resistance and fuel consumption.

For the Techies – How Hard is Rubber?

Natural rubber is the sap of a rubber tree, converted to a solid by coagulating it with acetic acid. Rubber used in tyres is generally the product of an oil refinery.

When combined with chemicals such as carbon black, antioxidants, and hosts more, sulphur added, the mixture subjected to heat and pressure, it comes out vulcanised. Sulphur makes the process irreversible.

Part of the “black art’ of making up the various mixtures used in the many components of a tyre, is varying the “hardness” of the rubber compound. For example, the rubber around the bead wire is compounded up to be quite ‘hard’ since it doesn’t move when the tyre rolls along. Conversely, the sidewall is ‘soft’, because it moves around a lot- it flexes.

However, most attention is paid to the tread compound, because this affects the wear and grip of the tyre because it’s the only part that hits the road.

How is it measured?

The tool used in the trade is a Shore A Hardness Durometer. Never heard of it? There is a range of them, designed to measure the hardness of different materials.

It simply is a small hand held tool with a domed plunger that is pressed into the surface of the rubber. The reading obtained on the quadrant scale when the needle is first pressed squarely against the rubber, is the hardness. Some cautions though- rubber hardness varies with temperature, it softens as it gets hot- every race car driver knows that. Also, the rubber ‘creeps’ away from the plunger, and as you hold the plunger against the tyre, the initial reading falls away.

So that is absolutely no help when the salesman tells you that the tread of the tyre that he’s selling is hard and long wearing. You might get a clue by pressing a reasonably blunt pencil into the rubber. If the rubber is “soft” the indentation might stay around a while after you remove the pencil. If it’s “hard”, the indentation might disappear quicker than for a softer rubber.

That’s not much help either, is it?

This is because there are many variations on a theme to make a tread compound. But beware of the salesman who tries to tell you that the tread is long wearing, and hard, and gives good grip, particularly in the wet. That’s nirvana, and hasn’t been achieved yet, to my knowledge.

So treads and sidewalls might have 1-2% sulphur, bead wire compounds 6% sulphur, and the old fashioned black ebonite ruler that granddad had, contained 35% sulphur, and was as hard as the hobs of hell.

I did say that it was a “black art”!

CarbonBlack TyreXchange on A Current Affair

Thanks for those of you who continue to promote CarbonBlack to your friends and to the media!

Last month A Current Affair on channel 9 covered the CarbonBlack’s tyre research and tyre dealer directory. It was all about looking for new tyres and the fact that only few people knew about their tyres. ACA had done an interesting  study showing that the less informed you are the more money you could possibly pay for your tyres.

Then, the show explained how you could research tyres and compare tyre dealers on CarbonBlack.

This is the main reason why tyre dealers join CarbonBlack:

CarbonBlack tyre dealers offer the right price and the right service. They are reputable dealers whose purpose is to satisfy customers rather than to sell by any means. That’s why our dealers accept to share information and to be reviewed on CarbonBlack by their customers. They understand today’s role of social networking as the most effective way to market, and that a longer term customer is worth more than a one-off over-paying one.

Tyre Buyers: On the old subject of price, remember to always compare apples to apples, or tread to tread. When replacing your tyres you get what you pay for.

• Know what you’re after: safety, performance or cost savings – you will not get all three in one tyre
• Do your research on the tyre dealer. Read reviews (eg. on CarbonBlack)
• Ask questions. Be sure you understand what you’re buying.

An informed customer is an empowered one.

The whole segment on CarbonBlack is available in the link below.

http://aca.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=860857

Why CarbonBlack?

Our Website is named CarbonBlack- because that’s what tyres are made of – right?

Well, partly – about 35% of a tyre is carbon black.
So what is it? And where does it come from?

As with most things these days “Oil” is the answer, which is one of the reasons why tyres cost so much.

Carbon black USED to be made from burning natural gas in insufficient air, and collecting the smoke that resulted, rich in carbon, on cooled metal surfaces. This was sometimes called “lampblack’, or later “channel black”. The pollution it caused was indescribable, let alone the waste that escaped to the atmosphere.

So another process took over in the early 1950s, called “furnace black”. Oil was burned inside a furnace in insufficient air, and the resulting carbon collected at the outlet. Dependent on the type of oil burned, the design of the furnace, the operating temperature, the flow rates, nozzle design, and any number of variations, it was quickly discovered that the actual properties of the carbon black (still just carbon remember) could be varied.

A whole new family of carbon blacks resulted, from the smallest particle size, intensely black as used in printing inks, to the larger and softer grades used in say motor tubes, which had quite a grey colour, and all the grades in between.

But wait- there’s more, as the Demtel man used to say.

The actual surface of each carbon particle could also be varied, to be extremely absorptive or low absorption. This structure varied the way that the carbon molecules could be intimately mixed into the long chain rubber molecules, which affected the degree of reinforcement imparted to the rubber by the carbon black. This then had a direct affect on the physical properties imparted to the rubber by mixing it with carbon black, such as wear, cut resistance, tensile strength, stiffness (modulus), elasticity, heat build-up under flexing, and a host of other properties.

So the fast developing science of carbon black became dominant in the development of rubber compounds. Without carbon black, tyres would be slippery in the wet, would wear out very quickly (particularly when hot), and generally would not be suitable for today’s automotive uses. That’s just the tread. Other blacks were designed for use in the casing, in the tubeless liner, bead compounds, bead stiffeners, and the many other applications used in a tyre.

The name of our web site pays homage to its importance to the rubber industry.

Terrible stuff to get out of your skin though. I couldn’t wear a white shirt for years!

CarbonBlack talks to The Australian Business

CarbonBlack talks about the importance of lead generation and it’s expansion into parts and accessories ecommerce. CarbonBlack in the Australian.

- The Australian, June 2009

CarbonBlack releases a widget for consumers to search and compare tyres online

Small, portable, fast…

What’s smaller than the latest smallest mobile phone, but much more portable ?
It’s the new “search tyres” widget from CarbonBlack.com.au, one of the major providers of automotive and tyre industry information in Australia.

Following on the recent launch of a car parts online shop on the website, CarbonBlack.com.au is further developing ways in which motor vehicle owners and car enthusiasts can easily and quickly “hook up” online with tyres and spare parts suppliers, as well as service providers to get their tyres changed, their car serviced or add a new tow bar to the ute !!

the tyre widget available at www.buycartyres.com.au

With the launch of this fast, light and highly portable web widget, Australian drivers will be able to instantly search and compare tyre models online anywhere on the web.

This is in line with our strategy to gain a significant presence in the auto service space this year

said CarbonBlack.com.au’s Sales development manager, Nigel McBride.

CarbonBlack is already discussing white labeling options with several parties, as other service / parts providers realize how they too can provide unique information with a new revenue stream in mind

he added.

The tyre widget is currently in beta version, but CarbonBlack has made it available for anyone to use at www.buycartyres.com.au.

In the month of April, over a million tyre models were viewed on CarbonBlack.
Now, the technology can be incorporated into other automotive trade businesses with minimal effort.

Revolutions in the tyre industry

Trivia question – two North Carolina residents changed the course of the world in 12 seconds 104 years ago. What were their first names?

Only 2 out of 700 (majority Americans) knew the answer – Orville and Wilbur.

As a result I have a very nice travel clock. Thank you Princess Alaskan Cruises. Took the mind off the 7 metre waves in the Bay of Alaska too!

So after 3 years or so, the Wright Brothers changed from skids to wheels and tyres (tires). These were made by Goodyear.

Goodyear are still a major supplier to the world’s aviation and defence industries, and they celebrate the centenary of the first tyres made specially for aircraft this year.

The Wright brothers chased weight savings assiduously, and Goodyear made special lightweight tyres for them. Aviation designers still are chasing weight reduction and tyre performace. Latest development are tyres for the Gulfstream jet which have an aluminium bead wire core, rather than steel. This saves 1.3 kg per tyre!

Want to know more about Goodyear’s centenary of aviation tyres? Go to  http://motorage.search-autoparts.article/articleDetail.jsp?id=950056

Tyre Tread Compounds

There’s a great deal of confusion amongst car enthusiasts, particularly the “rubber burners”, on tyre tread compounds and their make-up. One enthusiast on a car blog announced that tyres weren’t made from rubber at all, but from oil. You know what- he was mostly right!

Oils ain’t oils, and rubber ain’t rubber any more.

Tyres contain 3 or 4 different rubbery materials. One is natural rubber; which is the juice of a tree, which is coagulated using acetic acid, smoked and dried. The others are all made from oil, and are called “polymers”- another term is “long chain macromolecules” but don’t worry too much about that. It is now possible to make “natural rubber’ from oil too, but it’s cheaper to let the tree do it.

These various rubbers can be mixed together in different ratios in giant blenders to make a compound. At the same time, other important ingredients are added to make the resultant product tougher and stronger. A typical tyre compound may contain 10- 14 ingredients, all added for a specific reason. The most important of these is carbon black, of which there are many types.

A tyre typically has 7 to 11 compounds, each doing a specific job, be it encasing the bead wires, keeping the air in a tubeless tyre, flexing the sidewall, sticking the layers of nylon or polyester together, and so on. But there is only one compound that hits the road where it all happens, and that’s the tread compound.

This is basically the only criterion on which the motorist can judge the performance of the tyre, so it receives the most comment from car enthusiasts. The tyre engineer and chemist can vary the compound formula to maximise/minimise any tyre characteristic that he requires.

A typical passenger tyre tread compound contains as the base polymer styrene-butadiene copolymer, around 35% carbon black to reinforce it, and maybe some silica. These increase the abrasion resistance, tear strength, and cut resistance. Without them, the tyre would go gooey, and wear out very rapidly. Remember those old crepe rubber soled shoes?

Vulcanisation chemicals such as sulphur, zinc oxide, stearic acid, and accelerators make up 3-5%; antioxidants and antiozidants to stop it perishing or cracking, processing aids such as oil, resins, tackifiers to aid in the lay-up of the assembly are all incorporated.

Some tyres have two tread compounds- either side by side (very rare), or a cooler running undertread compound under a harder, hotter running cap stock. Most, however, only have one compound in the tread area.

The rubber used in tyres is normally a copolymer ( mixed and then polymerised together) of 23% styrene, and 77% butadiene. However, this ratio is not set in concrete, and specialty rubbers of different proportions of these two refinery products can be made. For example, “cling rubber”, which was widely touted for its improved wet grip, is 40% styrene, 60% butadiene. The resulting rubber ran hotter, and wore out quickly under Australian conditions. A 90% styrene, 10% butadiene rubber is used to make floor tiles, not car tyres.

Another rubber developed for use in tyres is polybutadiene. Butadiene is the most common feedstock from a refinery. However the resultant polymer suffers one big disadvantage- its wet grip is poor. Its big advantages are however, that it stands up to extreme abrasion much better than other rubbers, and runs cooler. Back in the days when the Armstrong 500 Miler was run at Phillip Island on standard tyres and rims, and the track was not a smooth hot mix like it is today, Harry Firth won the race by changing only one tyre, whilst everyone else changed at least twelve on the very abrasive track. But he lost 3 seconds a lap, because down on the ocean side, the tyres wouldn’t grip to racing levels. The tyres were made from a high proportion of polybutadiene in the tread, specially airfreighted out for the race.

We’re not as skilful as Harry Firth was then, and the Australian motorist puts “grip in the wet” as the top desirable characteristic from his tyres, so its use is now mainly confined to truck tyres in blends with natural rubber, where heat is the main enemy of tyre performance.

So ultimately, it’s the “grip” of the tread compound that drives, steers, and brakes the car, through the contact patch, around the area of a size 12 shoe. It does this by slipping! Sliding generates friction, and this causes things to happen. All tyres slip, particularly driven and steering tyres, which is why they wear out. No friction- no progress. Try driving and steering on black ice sometime to see what I mean.

“Rubber burners” overlay this with “sticky friction” by heating the tread surface till it starts to revert- goes gooey. Lots of smoke! On top of this, tyres generate heat internally from the stresses generated by flexing (the hysteresis loop). As the rubber warms up, the rubber changes its grip characteristics, provided that the compound hasn’t degraded to the gooey stage (“goes off”). This occurs generally in the thickest part of the tyre under the greatest load, like the outside shoulder of a tyre being driven on a banked circuit. That’s why you see tyre technicians who are evaluating tyres, drive a thermocouple needle into the shoulder of the tyre tread- the thickest part. The electric blankets on the wheels ready for a change onto a race car are there for the same reason- so that the car will handle similarly to the old, warmed up tyres.

The position of the white stripes in the tread grooves of the Formula 1 cars indicates the type of compound used in the tread. The tread grooves are there to slow the cars down, even when the road is dry. Race team managers under F1 Rules have to use at least two types of tyre during the course of the race. This adds another source of tactical variation for managers to consider, as though they haven’t got enough on their plate. But the race result may have been decided in a tyre development laboratory in Kobe or Luxemburg or wherever, since so much data has been accumulated on the vagaries of each circuit, and the tyre compound that performs best on that circuit.

It’s almost time for the Melbourne Grand Prix- so enjoy your viewing