Measurement and molecular modeling of rolling resistance in tire treads

Rolling resistance is a key tire property considered in the design and manu facturing of tires. Usually rolling resistance is measured by an expensive quantitative tire test using a prototype final product, In order to speed u p the development, efforts have been made to predict rolling resistance usi ng samples rather than prototype tires. One such attempt is to correlate th e mechanical loss factor tan(delta) to rolling resistance. However, this me thod is quite empirical and not useful if the influence of factors like pol ymer structure or filler on the rolling resistance is of interest. Especial ly for silica filled compounds or hybrid systems the correlation of rolling resistance with the loss factor is not successful. Combining dynamic mecha nical measurements with the mastercurve technique and the separation and mo deling of molecular relaxation processes yields an improved technique for p redicting the rolling resistance.