Greatest Hits: Tires and Timing Belts
Tire Story: In September 2004, I went tire shopping for the Jaguar. Four years ago, I bought a set of Pirellis for $472. I called the same tire folks and they now wanted $640! Ouch! Time to Dial For Dollars. After three phone calls, I found a national chain that quoted $499. Sold!
This got me wondering if the price bump was a Euro-to-Dollar thing. I didn't know if Pirellis are made in the U.S. or only in Italy. Ten years ago, I would have shrugged the question off as a mystery. Today ... Google to the rescue! I found that Pirelli has a new 426,000 square foot manufacturing plant in Rome ... Georgia! It is claimed to be the most automated tire facility in the world, using Pirelli's revolutionary MIRS (Modular Integrated Robotized System) technology. This patented process uses robots, working at a high rate of speed, to complete the entire production cycle from compounding to finished product - without interruption, without intermediates handling and storage phases and without wasted energy. A tire can be produced every three minutes.
MIRS builds each tire around an appropriately shaped aluminum drum. Raw rubber is heated and extruded on to the drum, followed by successive layers of steel wires and strips as the tire takes shape. After curing, the drum ingeniously collapses, leaving a finished tire - ready for use. The system is flexible; change the shape of the drum and you change the tire that emerges. Properly programmed, MIRS can build car, motorcycle, truck and tractor tires.
My first engineering job was in a filthy, carbon black-laced, inefficient Uniroyal factory almost 40 years ago. Rubber manufacturing has come a long way since then.
Plastic Tires? Amerityre, a Nevada firm, is experimenting with making tires out of polyurethane. Prototypes have now passed some basic federal safety standards. News articles claim that "some questions remain, including the tire's ability to hold traction on wet roads and resist flat-spotting during a sudden stop." Back in the 1960s, Uniroyal experimented with urethane tires. They had zero traction in the rain and, if they picked up the slightest amount of road oil, they would slip and spin until they burned up. I don't expect to see urethane tires on the road anytime soon.
Tires, Like Mayonnaise, Go Bad: I never knew this but old tires, even if they're stored away from sunlight, deteriorate to the point where they're dangerous. Even seven year old spare tires can suffer tread separation once they're put on the car and driven. Maybe this is another reason to get rid of the spare tire completely. Or dunk it in a vat of ArmorAll.
The UK Tyre Industry Council warned that motorists should replace tires that were "more than 10 years old, regardless of wear. The council said tire components dry with age and can separate. Anti-aging chemicals in tires are active only when a tire is in use ... spare tires, tires in storage or on a shelf, or tires that spend a long time on a trailer or a recreational vehicle run the risk of premature aging."
Timing Belts: Recently, I was inspecting a new Honda CR-V and was unable to hear the engine at idle - even when standing at the front of the car. Only when the hood was opened could I detect faint whirring sounds. I have never experienced such a quiet motor!
The moron car salesman claimed that it was due to the chain-driven overhead camshaft. This is utter baloney because chains are inherently more noisy than timing belts. Honda switched to chains because they last longer than timing belts - a sad commentary on the state of today's timing belt.
My first post-college job was with Uniroyal's Timing Belt Division in Philadelphia. Uniroyal held all of the patents on the timing belt; made their belts from the finest rubber (prime-grade neoprene), fabric (neoprene impregnated, high-denier nylon) and tensile cord (high-strength, braided, coated fiberglass - precision-wound and preloaded for tension on a mandrel) and charged whatever-the-hell they wanted. Those well-made belts could go over one-million miles without breaking; in fact, the pulleys failed before the belt did.
The first production automobile to use a timing belt in place of a chain to drive an overhead camshaft was the German-made 1962 Glas Frua coupe with a four-cylinder, 1.2-liter engine. The first American car to use a timing belt was the 1966 Pontiac Tempest on their overhead-cam, 230 cubic-inch, six-cylinder engine. (At Uniroyal, we had a Tempest Sprint company car with the factory four-speed floorshift and four-barrel carb; I drove it about 150 miles and was very impressed. 0-60 times were in the 8-9 second range - amazing for a little GM six-banger.) General Motors paid $1.76 for each belt - this was at a time when they were paying less than 20¢ for a fan belt.
Now that the patents have expired, the Uniroyal plant has closed, everybody makes timing belts and the automobile companies demand a supply of cheapie, price-is-everything, quality-be-damned belts and that's exactly what they get - a piece of black, rubber-toothed crap. And that is why timing belts must now be replaced at 60,000 mile intervals, lest they break and destroy the innards of the engine.
And now you know the rest of the story ... (with apologies to Paul Harvey). Good Day!!
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