Image credit – Goodyear Tires
Over time the more we drive our cars, the threads on our tires start to get bald. This is simple physics and science and there’s really not much we can do except to change our tires to new ones when that happens. However, perhaps in a bid to cut down on waste, Goodyear has a new tire concept that could deal with this issue.
The company has recently taken the wraps off a brand new tire concept that they are calling the ReCharge. What makes this tire so special is that it has the ability to print new threads by itself once the tire becomes too bald and is no longer safe to be used on the roads. It will be filled with a compound consisting of renewable materials such as dandelion rubber and synthetic spider silk.
This compound is excreted through a series of pipes onto the surface of the wheel where it will dry, cure, and eventually be set into a brand new pattern of threads. To top it off, not only can the tire print its own threads, but it has also been designed so that it doesn’t need to be pressurized, which in theory means that it will never go flat.
That being said, this is currently a concept so it is unclear if or when it will ever be made a reality. However, according to the company’s CTO, Chris Helsel, he told Engadget that he believes that the processes and features could arrive within the decade, so maybe we could eventually see such tires hit the market one day in the future.
Filed in .. Source: engadget