Silica Morphology: Beyond the Surface to Benefit Non-Tread Tire Components to Further Reduce Energy Loss

Rising fuel costs, a wide range of national and international legislation, and increased public attention continue to encourage the automotive industry to pursue increasingly environmentally friendly passenger car tires with improved fuel efficiency and safety.  The focus of the last few decades has been on the benefits derived from using silica in the tread to address mechanical energy dissipation leading to improvements in fuel efficiency and safety.  Recently there has been more focus on non-tread tire components which can account for more than 50% of the mechanical energy dissipation associated with a tire.  This paper will discuss how advances in silica technology have shown benefits in these non-tread tire components.  There will be particular emphasis on showing the benefits derived from fillers produced with the appropriate combination of a core precipitated silica particle with a significant organic surface, made up of coupling and non-coupling agents, to enable the appropriate development of filler-filler and polymer-filler interaction within hydrocarbon polymer based compounds.