Characterizing wear performance of tyre tread rubber

Abstract

Understanding the wear of tyre tread rubber is important for tyre design. A ’local wear law’ is needed in models of tyre contact mechanics to quantify wear on tyres. Previous studies on local wear laws faced limitations in temperature control or low frictional power, prompting the design of a new test rig to address these issues. The new rig was designed to measure wear under varying vertical loads, sliding speeds and contact temperature, with wear quantified by the mass loss of rubber samples.

Results indicated that on different sandpapers, wear rates normalised by area and sliding distance (giving units of kg/m³) were approximately proportional to vertical pressure and changed linearly with sliding speed, with a positive intercept. This is indicative of a ’machining’ process down to zero speed. When the measure of wear was normalised by sliding time (giving units of kg/m²$\cdot$ s), the wear law aligned with power laws measured in previous literature.