Methods for Collecting Tire Wear Particles

Recently, researchers have evaluated the potential for environmental health effects associated with tire wear particles; however, none have used particles that were generated from the tire pavement interface. In this study, two methods were investigated as a means of collecting representative tire wear particles (TWP) under real world driving conditions. An on-road method was developed to collect TWP generated from both a passenger vehicle and a truck. These systems involved installation of an aspiration nozzle behind one of the rear tires and retro-fitting the vehicles to accommodate the power necessary to run a vacuum system which collected the particles captured by the aspiration system. Additionally, TWP was collected using similar collection systems in two different road simulator laboratories. The particles collected by the on-road system and those generated in the laboratories were compared for morphology, size distribution and rubber content. The results of the analysis showed that the on-road and lab generated particles were similar in morphology, and rubber content, but differed in their particle size distributions. It was concluded that the laboratory method would be a suitable means of obtaining TWP that is not impacted by other constituents of road dust.