Tyre Contact Patch

[whitenemesis]

This video illustrates how little rubber is actually contacting the road, despite having wide tyres..

Check out the video at ~1min, beautiful shot of daylight shining through the tread grooves!..

BTW - anyone know where/what that building is at the start of the video?

[YOUTUBE]xSNFdV6-ib8[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Wizeng]

I had to do some work on low ground pressure tyres, to my amazement, the area of rubber on the road is equal to load on the wheel divided by tyre pressure, therefore wider wheels have a shorter contact patch.

 

[whitenemesis]

I had to do some work on low ground pressure tyres, to my amazement, the area of rubber on the road is equal to load on the wheel divided by tyre pressure, therefore wider wheels have a shorter contact patch.

Yes, I read an interesting paper on the physics of tyre contact area and traction. Narrow tyres give better accelerative grip, wide tyres better cornering grip..

But the point I was trying to highlight in the video is one can actually see the light shining between the treads, showing how little rubber is touching the road. It's just something I'd not seen before. All due to the white and very smooth surface here.

 

[Sp!ke]

I had to do some work on low ground pressure tyres, to my amazement, the area of rubber on the road is equal to load on the wheel divided by tyre pressure, therefore wider wheels have a shorter contact patch.

I think you've missed something there because those two variables on their own will not give you contact patch size.