Hi everyone,
I work for Hunter Boards and we are struggling with getting the pneumatics tires to a point where they are comparable in efficiency with urethane solid wheels.
To give a background, during the development of the skateboard we tested many different compounds of urethane and rubber, and even with the same hardness, we would get huge differences in range. We finally got to a range of 38km but initially, we were getting around 20km and the only thing that changed was the material but not the hardness.
Now we are having the same problem with pneumatics and are trying a few different approaches but since the escooter market is a lot more mature, maybe you guys already have the solution.
What we are doing right now:
1- Wide tires to reduce rolling resistance
Rolling resistance comes from tire hysteresis, the compound plays a huge part in this energy loss but geometry does too. The more a tire deforms the more it loses energy. To counteract this we are doing a wide tire. For the same mass(rider+skate weight), there is more area distributing that force, which results in a smaller tension. Tension is proportional to extension (deformation) so a wider tire will lose less energy to hysteresis.
2- Removing the tube and have a tubeless tire
Air doesn’t waste energy like rubber when compressed so the more air you have and the less rubber the lower the rolling resistance, because of that we are thinking of eliminating the inside tube and keep a low profile.
One big problem too is that we want to make a 5in tire which is really small.
I work for Hunter Boards and we are struggling with getting the pneumatics tires to a point where they are comparable in efficiency with urethane solid wheels.
To give a background, during the development of the skateboard we tested many different compounds of urethane and rubber, and even with the same hardness, we would get huge differences in range. We finally got to a range of 38km but initially, we were getting around 20km and the only thing that changed was the material but not the hardness.
Now we are having the same problem with pneumatics and are trying a few different approaches but since the escooter market is a lot more mature, maybe you guys already have the solution.
What we are doing right now:
1- Wide tires to reduce rolling resistance
Rolling resistance comes from tire hysteresis, the compound plays a huge part in this energy loss but geometry does too. The more a tire deforms the more it loses energy. To counteract this we are doing a wide tire. For the same mass(rider+skate weight), there is more area distributing that force, which results in a smaller tension. Tension is proportional to extension (deformation) so a wider tire will lose less energy to hysteresis.
2- Removing the tube and have a tubeless tire
Air doesn’t waste energy like rubber when compressed so the more air you have and the less rubber the lower the rolling resistance, because of that we are thinking of eliminating the inside tube and keep a low profile.
One big problem too is that we want to make a 5in tire which is really small.