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With an average car tire weighing in at 12 kg or so, I find it surprising that they can lose something like half a kilo per year and still be useable after a ha
by frankus 6y ago
With an average car tire weighing in at 12 kg or so, I find it surprising that they can lose something like half a kilo per year and still be useable after a half dozen years.
I suspect what’s going on is that heavy truck and bus tires are shedding the bulk of the mass.
I’m not sure if there’s a takeaway other than a preference for rail when all else is equal.
- zaroth 6y ago> In the car-happy United States, the amount jumps to nearly five kilograms—or about the weight of a cat. 1.25 kg/tire/year is a totally unbelievable quantity for a passenger car tire to shed annually.
- maxerickson 6y agoA medium size tire has ~5 square feet of surface area, so 3 or 4 square feet of tread. A tenth of an inch of wear on that surface is at least close to a pound of rubber.
- zaroth 6y agoThis EPA study[1] (Pg 21) shows tire wear per mile has an inverse relationship to speed, but averages around 0.005g/km - 0.02g/km per tire. (NOTE: their table is per axle, front tires wear twice as fast) 20,000 km would be 100-400g per tire. EDIT: Sorry, the units in the table shift from km, mi, single tire, axle, whole car, and it took me several tries to get the right numbers. https://cfpub.epa.gov/si/si_public_file_download.cfm?p_download_id=525701 https://cfpub.epa.gov/si/si_public_file_download.cfm?p_downl...
- maxerickson 6y agoYeah, in any case the paper gives smaller values than my estimate. It does use small vehicles though, at least relative to the last decades of production in the US (paper uses 1990s European sedans).
- rconti 6y agoIt is important not to misread this as "about the weight of a CAR" as I did, the first 5 times :)
- worik 6y agoI do not get six years from my tires.
- lotsofpulp 6y agoWhy would years matter? Would it not depend on how many miles are driven? And under what driving and road conditions?
- culopatin 6y agoYes, although if we were analyzing wear over time, when they get old (like dry rotted) they wear faster because they turn into dust much faster.