Posted on 02/15/2007 10:40:16 AM PST by Red Badger
Yokohama Rubber Co., Ltd. (YRC)—the seventh-largest tire manufacturer in the world—has developed a process that combines citrus oil with natural rubber to form a new compound it calls Super Nanopower Rubber (SNR). The major component of citrus oil is d-limonene.
The process reduces the use of petroleum products in tires by 80% and is part of YRC’s global EcoMotion environmental program. The first SNR product is the Decibel Super E-Spec, an all-new consumer passenger tire.
The fuel-saving E-Spec tire features an air permeation suppression film, a polymer lining designed to reduce air leakage from the tire, therby helping to maintain appropriate inflation levels.
Underinflated tires consume more power, thus using more fuel. The E-Spec is also a lot lighter and conserves gasoline by reducing rolling resistance by 18 percent. Low rolling resistance tires improve fuel efficiency by minimizing the energy wasted (as heat) as the tire rolls down the road. —Jim MacMaster, executive vice president, Business Division, of Yokohama Tire Corporation
The E-Spec tire featuring the SNR compound will be available in Japan later in the year, but no date has been determined for release in the US market.
Didn't the citrus crop get destroyed by global warming this year? I mean cooling.
Yes, you should check and adjust your tire pressure often. Check tire pressure first thing in the morning when the tires are cold; preferably before driven more than three miles. Adjust the pressure to the car manufacturers recommendations. However, it is more important that the both front tires are the same pressure and that both rear tires are the same pressure than they be the correct pressures.
Some tire sellers are using nitrogen instead of air to inflate tires, which decreases the rate of loss in air pressure. You can later mix air to the nitrogen.
.....Super Nanopower Rubber...
Tires sir, the topic is tires.
I Wonder about the self esteem of men who use nanorubbers. There must be a lot of them based on the spam I get.
chuckles...
Thank you!
I'm glad somebody got it.
I put Hankook tires on my truck.
I can't remember why, though.
I am not an expert here, but my guess would be that the tyres may be stopped by the brakes, but the reduced region of "flatness" at the surface of the road would imply less contact area of the tyre with the road, thereby leading to higher contact pressure there. This pressure could possibly exceed the pressure needed for catastrophic wearing of the tyre, which then might lead to the pulverised tyre material that forms between the stopped tyre and the road surface acting like tiny ball-bearings, leading to the vehicle to begin skidding.
My Dad has been either the buyer or the receiving clerk at a Goodyear plant for the last 30 years or so. He tells me that a typical tire is 65-70% petroleum products. I know he was working 14-hour days every day for weeks after Katrina, between the petroleum plants going down, and various other suppliers out of business. If we ever have a serious petroleum shortage, the price of tires will skyrocket.
Hopefully these new tires will actually amount to something and be useful. Too many times you read blurbs like this and nothing ever comes of the technology.
That appears to be silicone enhanced.
We are all lazy, roatate them, then check the pressure, do it when you have the oil change done. Save fuel, save tire wear, save yourself! Do I do it all the time, of course not, but we all should. :)
Thanks. I once was told to do all every month and that if I did I'd have a very clean engine and tires that would outlast those of other less attentive ppl. ;o)
Fayetteville, NC. It was a Kelly plant until a few years back -- it's still a little weird to see "Goodyear" out front.
I was kind of hoping they would be using whale oil so I could say, "Where the blubber meets the road..."
How did they get that thing where it sets without leaving tiretracks behind?
The only visibly partial tiretrack is between the camera and the rover, nearly obliterated by footprints.
Not without my "Super Nanopower Rubber."
Kumho? Extra-charge option?
They copied it from a 1917 John Deere tractor wheel.
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