Evolving Tread Grooves for Uniform Wear and Drainage
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Solution Overview
Problem
Tire treads with multiple grooves compromise tread material, leading to reduced service life, increased wear rate, and elevated rolling resistance due to decreased stiffness, while maintaining effective drainage performance is challenging, especially as the tread wears down.
Innovation Solution
A tread design featuring wavy grooves that alternate between open and closed parts, connected by bridges of rubber, forming continuous and disjointed networks at new and part-worn states respectively, to maintain drainage efficiency and uniform wear.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If multiple grooves are created in the tread to improve water drainage, then drainage performance is improved, but tread material is reduced leading to increased wear rate and reduced service life
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements nested grooves where secondary grooves are positioned within the walls of primary grooves. This nesting arrangement allows multiple drainage channels to be created without proportionally increasing material removal, as the nested grooves share the same material volume. The primary grooves provide main drainage paths while nested secondary grooves enhance drainage capacity within the same structural envelope, thereby improving water evacuation without linearly increasing wear rate.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent extends groove geometry into the radial dimension by creating grooves that open at different depths and levels within the tread thickness. Instead of only increasing groove quantity in the planar direction, the design utilizes the third dimension (radial depth) to create multiple drainage levels. This dimensional approach allows water to be channeled through various depths, improving drainage efficiency while maintaining tread material integrity and reducing overall material removal.
2Reliability
If grooves extend deep into the tread thickness to maintain drainage performance as tread wears, then drainage capability is maintained, but compression and shear stiffness are significantly reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The nested groove configuration allows deep drainage pathways to be created without requiring single deep grooves that would compromise structural integrity. By nesting secondary grooves within primary groove walls, the design achieves equivalent or superior drainage capacity distributed across multiple smaller channels, preserving more tread material and maintaining compression and shear stiffness while ensuring drainage performance throughout tread life.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the groove structure into multiple discrete levels and depths rather than creating one continuous deep groove. This segmentation divides the drainage function across multiple shallower channels at different radial positions, maintaining tread stiffness by preserving material between and around the segmented groove structures while still providing effective water evacuation pathways throughout the tread thickness.
3Productivity
If more grooves are created to enhance water evacuation, then water removal speed is improved, but rolling resistance and fuel consumption increase due to higher hysteresis losses
Solution Approach 1:
The nested groove design achieves enhanced water removal speed by creating multiple drainage channels within the same material envelope, rather than requiring numerous separate grooves that would increase overall tread void volume. This nested arrangement improves water evacuation efficiency while minimizing the total material removed, thereby reducing hysteresis losses and rolling resistance compared to conventional multi-groove designs.
Solution Approach 2:
By utilizing the radial dimension to create grooves at different depths and levels, the patent enhances water removal capability without proportionally increasing the planar footprint of groove structures. This dimensional approach improves water evacuation speed while maintaining better tread material continuity, reducing deformation cycles and associated hysteresis losses that contribute to rolling resistance.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This design ensures consistent drainage performance and reduced uneven wear throughout the tire's life, minimizing the impact on tread stiffness and maintaining effective water evacuation.
Implementation Method 1
Water that is not pushed over the front of the tire flows partially along the grooves and sipes formed in the tire tread
Implementation Method 2
these grooves delimit portions of material that are more sensitive to deformation by comparison with the portions delimited by sipes
Implementation Method 3
an increase in rolling resistance and therefore in the fuel consumption of vehicles fitted with such tires is observed, this being the result of an increase in hysteresis losses associated with the cycles of deformation of the material of which the tread is made
Implementation Method 4
wet weather driving conditions require the most rapid possible elimination of the water from the contact patch in which each tire is in contact with the roadway
Data Source
AI summary
The tread includes over at least a first axial part (M) at least one wavy groove in a first direction and wavy grooves in a second direction. The wavy grooves in the second direction are connected to the wavy groove in the first direction. Over at least a second axial part (B) of the tread, at least one wavy groove continuous in a third direction, and wavy grooves continue in a fourth direction. The wavy grooves in the fourth direction are connected to the wavy groove in the third direction. When new, the open parts of the first axial part (M) are connected to one another, and the open parts of the second axial part (B) are not connected with one another. Beyond a part-wear condition, the open parts of the second axial part (B) are connected to one another, and the open parts of the first axial part (M) are not connected with one another.