Experimental Study of High Frequency Response of Tyres

Most traditional tyre models concern the low and middle frequency ranges. It is necessary to include higher frequencies for improved accuracy in tyre/road interaction models. Often only the radial direction is included, although the tangential direction may be important, especially studying stick slip motion in the contact between tyre and road surface. Designing models requires insight into the behaviour of the tyre structure at higher frequencies. To add insight of high frequency behaviour, experimental studies were done on four different tyres with the same internal design but with different tread patterns. The results of this study underline the importance of the local deformation when forces act with small excitation areas on the tread. Adequate consideration of the tread properties in the tyre/road interaction models is thus of importance to obtain the correct local contact force distribution. This is most important for the tangential driving point mobility. Tread patterns are shown mainly to modify the flexural stiffness and mass in comparison to smooth tyres, while block resonances are not expected to be located in the frequency range in which tyre/road noise is important