Product Innovation for more fuel efficiency
Now there's a deal. If I buy a car tire with Degussa's latest product innovation, I will have saved the amount I paid within a year. The Düsseldorf-based specialty chemicals company has developed a new silane that makes another significant reduction in the rolling resistance of tires, this time by more than 10 percent, as compared with conventional silica/silane systems. The result? Fuel efficiency that doesn't sacrifice driving comfort. All other tire properties, such as wet grip and mileage, remain unchanged. Depending on the basis for comparison - silica/silane tires on the one hand and carbon black tires on the other - a driver saves between 3 and 8 percent on fuel. According to Thomas Hermann, head of Degussa's Advanced Fillers & Pigments Business Unit, which produces the new silane "Si 363," the economic advantages are clear: "Based on 30,000 kilometers driven per year, the money spent on a new set of tires can be recovered within one year." Leading tire manufacturers are already testing the brand new Degussa silane, and experts predict that the first tires containing Si 363 will enter the market soon.
Fuel efficient and environmentally safe
The leading part that rolling resistance plays in fuel efficiency makes it a more critical property in auto tires than ever before. Given the explosive rise in fuel prices, each reduction in the rolling resistance of tires means ready cash in the driver's wallet, and a bonus for our environment. Lower fuel consumption means fewer CO2 emissions, and therefore less greenhouse effect - an area in which Degussa is also setting new standards. "In contrast to silanes used in the past, VOC (volatile organic compounds) emissions in the tire manufacturing process are reduced by up to 80 percent," stresses Bernhard Schwaiger, head of Degussa's Advanced Fillers Technical Service department, underlining the ecological benefits of the new silane.
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Put on the test drum - new tires undergo exhaustive examination at facilities like this one at the Institute for Automotive Engineering and Power Train Engineering at the Helmut Schmidt University in Hamburg. One of the main parameters evaluated is the rolling resistance coefficient, which is largely determined by the tire tread's rubber compound. The lower the rolling resistance coefficient, the less energy is lost while the tire is in motion. |
Chemical coupling
Tire compounds normally contain about 30 percent reinforcing filler, which is primarily what gives the rubber compounds their desirable properties, such as grip, abrasion resistance, tear and cut resistance. For decades, these properties were achieved only by using custom carbon blacks. An additional ingredient is making it possible for today's car tires to benefit from even greater customization - namely, silica. Because of the different chemical properties of rubber and silica, however, these components cannot be bonded together in a rubber compound, so bifunctional organic silicon compounds, or organosilanes for short, are used to help bond the two substances. This silica/silane technology was originally developed by Degussa and then brought to market maturity by leading tire manufacturers. The tread compounds of these kinds of silica/silane tires contain silica as an active reinforcing agent. To achieve the best level of properties, developers use bifunctional silanes such as Si 363 or Degussa's silane Evergreen Si 69 to "join" the rubber with the reinforcing agent. Nowadays, almost every car in Europe is fitted with tires whose treads contain silica.
Degussa is the only manufacturer worldwide to offer the tire industry a single source for the three most important reinforcing components, which is why it is the internationally leading manufacturer of reinforcing systems for the rubber industry. The Group is the market leader in performance silica and organosilanes, and the second-largest producer of rubber and pigment blacks, with technical service centers in Europe, America, and Asia.