Tire Tread Sipe Locking Regions for Snow Ejection
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Tire sipes tend to become filled with snow or ice particles, reducing their effectiveness in providing grip, while increasing groove width to improve snow removal compromises tread rigidity and edge number.
Innovation Solution
Designing sipes with a mean width of at least 1.5 mm and mechanical locking regions that occupy 10-60% of the wall surface area, allowing for efficient ejection of particles and maintaining tread rigidity, along with optional widened sections and zigzag geometries to enhance mechanical locking and surface roughness.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If sipes are made narrow to increase the number of edges on the tread surface, then grip is improved, but the sipes become easily filled with snow or ice particles
Solution Approach 1:
The sipe structure incorporates regions with different widths: narrow regions (less than 0.6 mm) that provide mechanical locking and edge effectiveness, and wide regions (at least 1.5 mm) that resist filling with snow or ice particles. This local variation in width allows each region to perform its specific function optimally.
Solution Approach 2:
The sipe is divided into multiple functional regions along its length: narrow locking regions that provide mechanical interlocking and edge effectiveness, and wide regions that prevent particle accumulation. This segmentation allows the sipe to simultaneously achieve both edge effectiveness and resistance to filling.
2Reliability
If groove width is increased to at least 3 mm to remove snow particles, then snow removal is improved, but tread rigidity is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of making all grooves wide throughout, the invention creates localized wide regions within the sipe structure that provide snow particle ejection capability, while the majority of the sipe structure maintains narrow dimensions to preserve tread rigidity and edge effectiveness.
3Reliability
If groove width is increased to at least 3 mm to remove snow particles, then snow removal is improved, but the number of edges is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The sipe structure incorporates localized wide regions that provide snow particle ejection capability, while the majority of the sipe structure maintains narrow dimensions to preserve the number of edges and edge effectiveness on the tread surface.
Solution Approach 2:
The sipe is divided into multiple functional regions: narrow regions that maintain edge effectiveness and contribute to the overall number of edges, and localized wide regions that provide snow particle ejection capability without significantly reducing the total number of edges.
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
The solution maintains edge effectiveness by easily ejecting snow and ice particles while ensuring high tread rigidity and performance, even when sipes are filled, through strategic design features like locking regions and surface roughness.
Implementation Method 1
each wall of these sipes comprises at least one region intended to collaborate with a region on the opposing other wall so as to reduce relative movements of the said walls with respect to one another by mechanically locking them together
Implementation Method 2
the centrifugal force created as the tire rotates has the effect of throwing out the particles that fill the grooves
Data Source
AI summary
A tire tread comprising a plurality of sipes (30), each sipe being delimited by two opposing main walls (31, 32), each of the said walls consisting of a mean surface of which the intersection with the tread surface in the initial condition forms an edge, the mean width of each sipe measured as the mean distance between the edges formed by the opposing main walls (31, 32) of the said sipe on the tread surface in the initial condition is at least equal to 1.5 mm, each of the main walls (31, 32) comprising at least one locking region (310, 320), each locking region collaborating with a locking region opposite in such a way as to mechanically block relative movements of the said walls at least when the tire is in contact with the road surface.