Asymmetric Sipe Tread Pattern for Tire Steering Stability
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing pneumatic tire designs face challenges in maintaining steering stability during cornering, as the deformation of inner and outer land regions affects the transient characteristics of the tire's ground contact patch, leading to uneven wear and reduced grip performance.
Innovation Solution
The tire features an asymmetrical tread pattern with continuous circumferential main grooves and sipes that smoothly connect the crown land region to the shoulder land region, ensuring uniform deformation and improved rigidity, thereby enhancing steering stability through the use of first and second sipes that extend towards the tread edges and are inclined to match the tire's axial direction.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If sipes are provided in axially inner land regions and axially outer shoulder land regions with different configurations, then steering stability is improved, but transient characteristics during cornering at large slip angles are deteriorated due to different deformation modes of land regions
Solution Approach 1:
The tread pattern employs asymmetric sipe configurations where first sipes extend from the crown land region through the middle land region to the shoulder land region, while second sipes extend only from the crown land region toward the tread edge. This asymmetric design allows different land regions to deform in a coordinated manner during cornering, improving transient characteristics while maintaining steering stability.
Solution Approach 2:
The sipe system is segmented into two distinct types: first sipes that span multiple land regions (crown, middle, and shoulder) and second sipes that are localized to the crown and middle land regions. This segmentation enables independent optimization of deformation behavior in different tread zones, resolving the contradiction between steering stability and transient cornering characteristics.
2Ease of operation
If the crown land region is allowed to deform appropriately at small slip angles, then moderate initial steering response is obtained, but transient characteristic deteriorates when the ground contact patch center moves from crown land region toward shoulder land region during cornering at large slip angles
Solution Approach 1:
The sipe configuration enables dynamic adaptation of land region deformation based on slip angle conditions. At small slip angles, the crown land region deforms freely for responsive steering. At large slip angles, the interconnected first sipes coordinate deformation across crown, middle, and shoulder land regions, maintaining stable transient characteristics during the transition of ground contact patch center.
Data Source
AI summary
The pneumatic tire comprises a tread portion 2 provided with first sipes 25 and second sipes 26 and having a first tread half portion 21 and a second tread half portion 22. The first sipes 25 are smoothly continued from a crown land region 10 in the second tread half portion 22 to a shoulder land region 13 in the first tread half portion 21 through a crown main groove 3 and a shoulder main groove 5. The second sipes 26 extend from the crown land region 10 in the second tread half portion 22 toward a second tread edge Te2.