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Innovation Gets Tired, Part 1: The Non-Pneumatic Tire

By Rain Noe - December 27, 2011

in Cars

Remember Ron Arad's spring steel wheel bicycle? Wisconsin-based Resilient Technologies, a company that develops "advanced mobility products," makes something similar for motor vehicles: The Non-Pneumatic Tire.

But while Arad's bike wheels are designed to turn heads, the NPT is designed to survive military conflicts; the U.S. Army Research Laboratory is current testing them out on Humvees, as "the NPT will not go flat if shot or hit by shrapnel from a roadside bomb."

While there's no public footage of the NPT under attack, here's what the wheel looks like in milder testing:

And here's what it looks like on a civilian vehicle:

Lastly, here's a similar concept—I haven't been able to determine if this last one is made by Resilient Technologies or a competitor—in a more heavy-duty application:

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Jimbo

12 years ago

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Sidewalls would keep the mud and rocks from getting inside and breaking the honeycomb matrix.
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Tom

12 years ago

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What would the advantage to sidewalls be?
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Simon

12 years ago

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Open sidewall design is probably necessary at this point for testing and engineering development. Final product would most likely have integral sidewalls, but perhaps with a valve designed to regulate internal pressure / vacuum resulting from environmental and mechanical temperature and humidity effects. I don't see these as replacing conventional pneumatic tires for road vehicles, but they certainly have great potential in hostile environments.
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Leonard7

12 years ago

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Good idea. But, is it going to be bumpy when we stop? we need solution for the Inertia's Impact.
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Branden Fulton

12 years ago

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I would like to see a long distance highway test, seems a more likely problem would be the tread detaching at excessive speed rather than slow rock crawling.
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James Smith

12 years ago

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How about in mud and sand? Brings new meaning to "you've got mud in your tires"
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Kyle King

12 years ago

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What is this tech like at higher speeds?
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Brian Piper

12 years ago

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Similar to Michelins 'Tweel' from a few years back: http://www.gizmag.com/go/3603/

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