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Goodyear claims to have reinvented the wheel.

CAPSLOCKSTUCK

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Goodyear has reinvented the wheel by creating a spherical tire which looks like the BB-8 from Star Wars - that allows cars to drive sideways.
The company unveiled the Eagle-360 at the Geneva International Motor Show that is designed for the autonomous cars of tomorrow.
The spherical tire is linked to the car by magnetic force so it can rotate on any axis in any direction.
This gives the car ultra-maneuverability and could pave the way for smaller car parks and more efficient used of road space because it allows the car to move sideways.






https://corporate.goodyear.com/en-U...eveals-concept-tires-for-autonomous-cars.html
 

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:eek: This would put a lot of wheel and tire thieves out of business. :laugh:

Guess the criminals need a union to fight the corporate man now.
 

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a) tire wear is going to be a bitch.
b) hydroplanning will be common and extremely dangerous
c) the surface area of the tire on the road is likely smaller than that of a normal tire which means reduced handling, traction, and braking.
d) how much power does it require to levitate the vehicle above the spheres?
e) what's the maximum speed this can go before the spheres escape their magnetic constraints?
f) vehicles have a lot of interior space because of how little space the tires occupy--that won't be the case with spheres.

Goodyear may have designed an awesome tire for a vehicle that doesn't exist. 99% of the technology is in the vehicle itself and, as far as I know, no one is interested in conceptualizing it nor manufacturing it.
 
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Suspension will be non existent and carbon fibre body work is out.
Also no fatties allowed as magnetic force will have to increase to compensate.
 

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Suspension will be non existent and carbon fibre body work is out.
Also no fatties allowed as magnetic force will have to increase to compensate.

Quite the opposite. Suspension would be awesome. Magnetic fields bend so it depends on the housing clearance. On standard roads you'd get a very smooth ride (think Maglev). But off road, it'd need careful height consideration.

The fatties point is therefore true.
 

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a) tire wear is going to be a bitch.
b) hydroplanning will be common and extremely dangerous
c) the surface area of the tire on the road is likely smaller than that of a normal tire which means reduced handling, traction, and braking.
d) how much power does it require to levitate the vehicle above the spheres?
e) what's the maximum speed this can go before the spheres escape their magnetic constraints?
f) vehicles have a lot of interior space because of how little space the tires occupy--that won't be the case with spheres.

Goodyear may have designed an awesome tire for a vehicle that doesn't exist. 99% of the technology is in the vehicle itself and, as far as I know, no one is interested in conceptualizing it nor manufacturing it.

Top of that what about speed bumps and when you have to change a tire, ooh my the pain.
 
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a) tire wear is going to be a bitch.
b) hydroplanning will be common and extremely dangerous
c) the surface area of the tire on the road is likely smaller than that of a normal tire which means reduced handling, traction, and braking.
d) how much power does it require to levitate the vehicle above the spheres?
e) what's the maximum speed this can go before the spheres escape their magnetic constraints?
f) vehicles have a lot of interior space because of how little space the tires occupy--that won't be the case with spheres.

Goodyear may have designed an awesome tire for a vehicle that doesn't exist. 99% of the technology is in the vehicle itself and, as far as I know, no one is interested in conceptualizing it nor manufacturing it.

a) it would be expensive and require a trip to the garage. Though I'm sure they wouldn't have to throw the whole thing in the trash, just send it back for recycling.
b) That would be dependant on a lot of things. They would have to go through plenty of testing to find the general coefficient of kinetic friction, etc vs. tire pressure. At the end of the day it'd be a non-issue
c) This is the same as point b
d) More than if they were resting on axles. Yet, maglev trains work on the same principle and are feasible.
e) light-speed. Braking may be a problem though.
f) yup
 

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There is always this option loool.
 

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a) it would be expensive and require a trip to the garage. Though I'm sure they wouldn't have to throw the whole thing in the trash, just send it back for recycling.
I was going more after uneven wear. If you drive in a straight line most of the time, you're going to get a wear pattern in the tire. When you turn or do something to cause the tire not to be in that tract any more, it will get obnoxiously loud and rough like driving on the zipper.

b) That would be dependant on a lot of things. They would have to go through plenty of testing to find the general coefficient of kinetic friction, etc vs. tire pressure. At the end of the day it'd be a non-issue
It would because all tires have channels that guide water into and away from the tire. They work as a function of knowing how the tire spins. With a sphere, there is no rhyme or reason to how the tire rotates. As per the above, either it will fail at channeling water away or it will be obnoxious. Further, if the software makes a mistake while a loss-of-traction situation is unfolding, people could die. It takes all of the tires working together to regain control after the vehicle has lost control. It theoretically could be done with this kind of set up but I have my doubts.

d) More than if they were resting on axles. Yet, maglev trains work on the same principle and are feasible.
Because maglevs don't carry their power source; they take it from the track.

e) light-speed. Braking may be a problem though.
The sphere would fail long before that due to centripical force. The sphere may also escape its socket at very low velocity.

suddenly i think of this
View attachment 72571
This, in my mind, is far more feasible than magnetic. Wear would still be a huge problem though.
 
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I was going more after uneven wear. If you drive in a straight line most of the time, you're going to get a wear pattern in the tire. When you turn or do something to cause the tire not to be in that tract any more, it will get obnoxiously loud and rough like driving on the zipper.


It would because all tires have channels that guide water into and away from the tire. They work as a function of knowing how the tire spins. With a sphere, there is no rhyme or reason to how the tire rotates. As per the above, either it will fail at channeling water away or it will be obnoxious. Further, if the software makes a mistake while a loss-of-traction situation is unfolding, people could die. It takes all of the tires working together to regain control after the vehicle has lost control. It theoretically could be done with this kind of set up but I have my doubts.


Because maglevs don't carry their power source; they take it from the track.


The sphere would fail long before that due to centripical force. The sphere may also escape its socket at very low velocity.


This, in my mind, is far more feasible than magnetic. Wear would still be a huge problem though.

You're right on all points, but I can't visualize how the sphere's would escape from the socket, the radius of the opening is smaller than the radius of the tyre.
I wouldn't be surprised if there were some cool engineering tricks to negate the other problems. I wonder how big the neodymium magnets would have to be to levitate the car.
 
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FordGT90Concept

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You're right on all points, but I can't visualize how the sphere's would escape from the socket, the radius of the opening is smaller than the radius of the tyre.
I wouldn't be surprised if there were some cool engineering tricks to negate the other problems. I wonder how big the neodymium magnets would have to be to levitate the car.
If these things have air in them to provide cushion and extend the life of the tire, one would have to be able to field-replace them with a spare just like we do with spare wheels today. Imagine the design of the socket to allow field replacement. That same design consideration is what potentially makes the sphere escape the socket.

Neodymium could be used to suspend the vehicle from the sphere but it would not provide momentum. Electromagnets are required. Let's also not forget that neodymium magnets are dangerous which translates to more money to service the vehicle.
 
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Also no fatties allowed as magnetic force will have to increase to compensate.

God damnit, why is this world so opposed to us fat people? WE WILL CRUSH YOU!
 
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Goodyear has reinvented the wheel by creating a spherical tire which looks like the BB-8 from Star Wars - that allows cars to drive sideways.

The spherical tire is linked to the car by magnetic force so it can rotate on any axis in any direction.
This gives the car ultra-maneuverability and could pave the way for smaller car parks and more efficient used of road space because it allows the car to move sideways.

If you haven't been sideways on conventional tires, you're not trying hard enough :roll:
 
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Been there
Done That
survived that and got the brown stained under pants to prove ito_O:laugh::p

and on both a car and more frighting on a motercycle

Yeah, most bikes I know of (over here) have no kind of anti-lock system so it's quite easy to do at lower speeds. You just have to realize to let go of the brakes before going over and hope you are orientated in the correct direction to avoid whatever you had slammed the brakes on to avoid.
 
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a) tire wear is going to be a bitch.
b) hydroplanning will be common and extremely dangerous
c) the surface area of the tire on the road is likely smaller than that of a normal tire which means reduced handling, traction, and braking.
d) how much power does it require to levitate the vehicle above the spheres?
e) what's the maximum speed this can go before the spheres escape their magnetic constraints?
f) vehicles have a lot of interior space because of how little space the tires occupy--that won't be the case with spheres.

Goodyear may have designed an awesome tire for a vehicle that doesn't exist. 99% of the technology is in the vehicle itself and, as far as I know, no one is interested in conceptualizing it nor manufacturing it.

You seem to lack creativity in this matter. Let's go point by point.

1) Not really. You've got a sphere, and you can rotate said sphere however you'd like. Just like with the write leveling in an SSD, you simply need to change the wear surface. This could be done automatically, by having the spherical tires move in something other than a circle. As long as fricative force on each side equals zero when summed, you travel in a straight line. This would have to be done by complex equations, but it's not unreasonable when you consider the magnetic control system that this is going to require. In fact, given the same tread depth that sphere will have a greater surface area than a wheel of the same diameter, leading to a longer lifetime if wear leveling is done properly.

2) No more so than normal. I'm really not sure where you're getting this. The same surface area, and the same coefficient of friction are being experienced. This is dependent upon vehicle mass, and contact surface properties. If you can somehow demonstrate that the sphere would have less surface area I'd agree, but assuming tire pressure and car mass are the same simple physics demonstrates contact area would be the same.

3) Again, this is a mystery of logic. In a traditional tire the surface area of contact is a function of the air pressure inside it. Put simply, air pressure must equal pressure applied by the mass of the car. The same principle applies here. This is why you release tire air when you want to go off road, and why you increase it on pavement (think fuel efficiency).

4) None. The point is repulsion. Two stationary magnetic fields can repel one another sufficiently to have the car levitate indefinitely. The catch, or course, is the strength of those fields and the fact that the vehicle would have a hard maximum in loading capacity. It's likely that there will be a combination of static and dynamic fields, in order to provide power savings with increased loading capacity. That sort of thing isn't going to be covered in this sort of a promotional video.

5) You're missing the design work. The spheres are enclosed in a casing that covers more than half of them. Think ball bearings, and the races they reside in. The only danger of "escape" is if the cage was made out of a weak material.

6) I'm flummoxed here. Either you don't get the concept, or entirely miss the point. A modern car has the engine, transmission, axle, steering assembly, braking, and various other systems. Remove all of that. What you need is an electronic control system, some magnets, and electromagnets. Your tires take up more space, but you suddenly don't have 80% of the bulky items. It's all controlled by magnetic fields, which are all driven off of a computer control system. Let's find an analog to describe it. How much room does a Tesla lose by having motors in the wheels? Each drive motor is a rather substantial use of space, yet because there's no transmission and central engine the actual body of a Tesla is more roomy than one would imagine (given its styling).


In short, this is the tire of a very far future. One in which the computers in our cars have to be significantly better than anything we've got today. While this is interesting, and surprisingly practical, it's a PR piece. I'm not sure how they plan on dealing with road debris (a steel nail or screw sucks today, but magnets that strong will turn a nail into a bullet). I'm not convinced they've developed a simplified algorithm for three dimensional wear leveling. I'm not even sure if they've got the hardware to make this happen reasonably (read: copper is surprisingly expensive). All of this is feasible from an engineering perspective, but likely a pipe dream from a cost perspective.


Edit:
If these things have air in them to provide cushion and extend the life of the tire, one would have to be able to field-replace them with a spare just like we do with spare wheels today. Imagine the design of the socket to allow field replacement. That same design consideration is what potentially makes the sphere escape the socket.

Neodymium could be used to suspend the vehicle from the sphere but it would not provide momentum. Electromagnets are required. Let's also not forget that neodymium magnets are dangerous which translates to more money to service the vehicle.

You seem to have missed the other "tires of the future" designs. The field servicing is a reasonable issue, but remove the air filled inner tube. You replace the air with a honeycomb of rubber, such that the tire is now directly connected to the magnetic core of the sphere. No more problems (and the earlier comments I made involving pressure still sand, even if that's from mechanical loading rather than pneumatic forces).

You no longer have flats, and truly incompetent drives, the ones who don't pay attention to tread depth, get a reminder that it's time to replace tires whenever there's a constant vibration (due to a patch wearing through, without having the tires fail.

Yes, self-maintenance is no longer possible with a design like this. Between the enclosed shell, and the strong magnets, you need to employ a mechanic. Of course, that'd be a given with the entire vehicle having to be converted into a massive electronic control though.


a) it would be expensive and require a trip to the garage. Though I'm sure they wouldn't have to throw the whole thing in the trash, just send it back for recycling.
b) That would be dependant on a lot of things. They would have to go through plenty of testing to find the general coefficient of kinetic friction, etc vs. tire pressure. At the end of the day it'd be a non-issue
c) This is the same as point b
d) More than if they were resting on axles. Yet, maglev trains work on the same principle and are feasible.
e) light-speed. Braking may be a problem though.
f) yup

While we agree, you're off on some of your statements.

a) The concept is from a rubber company. Their recycling would likely be similar to that of a starter, or alternator today. The item has two prices, one when you buy it new and one where you turn the old one in and get a core charge reimbursement. The core would be the magnets and metal, stripped out of the rubber by a chemical or physical process. Please refer to above though, because the original concern was invalid.

b) This is a valid idea, applied oddly. The video makes no mention of the surfaces, so it's pretty odd to assume that the surface will be something other than vulcanized rubber (good wear, high coefficient of friction, and relatively low cost). As such, the initial question was invalid. Consider that this is Good Year, a company highly invested in continuing to produce the products they're already tooled to make.

d) Completely different application. Maglev is allowed to pull large amounts of energy, and it only moves on tracks. Both of these limitations make the comparison unsuitable for parity. What you should be citing is magnetic bearings. They work with two magnetic fields constantly repelling one another, allowing for minimal friction.

e) No. Just no. You're applying forces via a magnetic field. Said field generates hysterical losses, not to mention the fact that your brakes are entirely based upon hysteresis. These wheels will likely be specified to run at the same speeds cars do today, for the simple reason that rubber to road is still the limiting factor. I understand you falling back on the theory here, but it's too fantastic to be of practical use.

f) Wrong for so many reasons. You lose volume with the tire, but gain it back with everything else that doesn't need to be included. There is absolutely no reason that competent design would produce a car that has appreciably less interior space with a spherical wheel.
 
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Assuming these are designed to be fully self contained and self propelling, they would require a substantial power source built in to the vehicle, much like electric cars do already. Until a better storage system is produced I can't see this having the range most people require.
 
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Assuming these are designed to be fully self contained and self propelling, they would require a substantial power source built in to the vehicle, much like electric cars do already. Until a better storage system is produced I can't see this having the range most people require.

Yeah, we need a breakthrough beyond LithiumIon to really get there I think.
 
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There is always this option loool.

This would save alot of time and frustration in those parallel parking. Why this thing is not selling now?
 
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Even if somehow Goodyear manages to get it out for other countries, it will be out of business in India. First of all the bumps and hazardous material thrown on road will cause a lot of pain as the magnetic induction used for mechanism will be damaged due to unbalanced movement on the road. Changing the complete magnetic unit if damaged will cost a lot. And when needed to replace tires the road assist services in India are not that good so then changing that heavy tires will be like hell. Overall this concept will most probably not work for Indian or countries which have similar roads.
 
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It just occured to me:

They did NOT reinvent the wheel. Wheel's are circular.

They reinvented the sphere. Marketing dumbasses need to go back to geometry class...
 
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