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Tyre wear is proportional to the fourth power of wheel load; reducing weight per wheel is the key here. Hiwever, taxing new tyres may be counterproductive, sin

Tyre wear is proportional to the fourth power of wheel load; reducing weight per wheel is the key here. Hiwever, taxing new tyres may be counterproductive, since encouraging folk to keep using their worn tyres is not a good outcome for road safety.

potato3732842 2y ago
Tyre wear is proportional to the fourth power of wheel load; reducing weight per wheel is the key here. No, it's not. You're taking a very loose rule of thumb for road surface wear and baselessly applying it to tires. Tire wear follows the rubber the tire is made out of. Soft rubber wears faster. Once you control for that it's acceleration and braking loads (i.e. driving style) that dominate. After that is when weight starts mattering. If what you said was even remotely true then heavy vehicles would get obviously less life out of tires compared to compact cars when in reality they get about the same
- david-gpu 2y ago
  > If what you said was even remotely true then heavy vehicles would get obviously less life out of tires compared to compact cars when in reality they get about the same Are you assuming that the tires of heavy vehicles have the same thickness as lighter vehicles? My bike has much thinner tires than any car, and they can last ten thousand kilometers.
- danielheath 2y ago
  I'm not sure where you're getting these ideas from. Best estimate I can see of prime mover tyre lifespan is 40,000-120,000 km. I'd be quite happy if I could get that kind of lifespan out of my cars tyres.
  - antisthenes 2y ago
    > I'd be quite happy if I could get that kind of lifespan out of my cars tyres Are you saying you can't even get 40,000 km out of your car tyres? You might have a defective product on your hands or need to look into the way you drive or inflate your tires.
qwerty_clicks 2y ago
Tires these days are expensive. To make them cheaper, they have reduced quality as well. Likely wearing faster and with worse material

potato3732842 2y ago

Tyre wear is proportional to the fourth power of wheel load; reducing weight per wheel is the key here. No, it's not. You're taking a very loose rule of thumb for road surface wear and baselessly applying it to tires. Tire wear follows the rubber the tire is made out of. Soft rubber wears faster. Once you control for that it's acceleration and braking loads (i.e. driving style) that dominate. After that is when weight starts mattering. If what you said was even remotely true then heavy vehicles would get obviously less life out of tires compared to compact cars when in reality they get about the same

david-gpu 2y ago
> If what you said was even remotely true then heavy vehicles would get obviously less life out of tires compared to compact cars when in reality they get about the same Are you assuming that the tires of heavy vehicles have the same thickness as lighter vehicles? My bike has much thinner tires than any car, and they can last ten thousand kilometers.
danielheath 2y ago
I'm not sure where you're getting these ideas from. Best estimate I can see of prime mover tyre lifespan is 40,000-120,000 km. I'd be quite happy if I could get that kind of lifespan out of my cars tyres.
- antisthenes 2y ago
  > I'd be quite happy if I could get that kind of lifespan out of my cars tyres Are you saying you can't even get 40,000 km out of your car tyres? You might have a defective product on your hands or need to look into the way you drive or inflate your tires.

qwerty_clicks 2y ago

Tires these days are expensive. To make them cheaper, they have reduced quality as well. Likely wearing faster and with worse material