6. Molds are generally made...
6. Molds are generally made from cast aluminum. Pictured are two rings of aluminum that are waiting to be machined. There are also different types of molds, but light-truck tires tend to be made using segmented (multipiece) molds.
7. Here is one of the many...
7. Here is one of the many machines used to create the molds. One of the fascinating aspects of the Tall Timbers mold plant is that an automated system loads the raw material and unloads the machined product to and from each machine.
8. Here you can see a mold...
8. Here you can see a mold as it becomes recognizable during the machining process. During the machining, all of the aluminum shavings are automatically collected from each machine, washed, and sent to a central storage area for scrap.
9. All of the tooling for...
9. All of the tooling for the mold-making machines is produced in-house. Here, Tall Timbers Mold Operations and Technology Manager John Corbin shows some of the tooling created by the team.
10. This is a wire electrical...
10. This is a wire electrical discharge machine and its job is to cut a mold into numerous pieces. This is how a segmented (or multipiece) mold is created after it is machined as one unit. In this case, the machine uses a 0.12-inch-thick wire to cut this mold into eight pieces. From here, it goes to a saw to be cut again, after which it will be production-ready.
11. At the tire-manufacturing...
11. At the tire-manufacturing plant, technicians blend and mix the raw materials used to make the rubber compounds that will form the various parts of the tire. Tires consist of the inner liner, beads, body plies, antichafing strips, steel belts, tread, and sidewall. Here you can see the tread stock after it has been extruded through precision-formed dies. It is then cut to the desired lengths before being delivered to the tire-building machines.
12. Like the tread, the sidewall...
12. Like the tread, the sidewall stock is extruded through precision-formed dies and then cut to desired lengths for delivery to the tire-building machines
13. After being manufactured...
13. After being manufactured in-house, the steel-corded belts used in the tires are cut into prescribed widths to fit the exact tire specification created by the engineers.
14. To keep a tire locked...
14. To keep a tire locked firmly in place on a rim, high-tensile bronze-coated steel wires are covered with rubber and wound into precisely sized rings called bead bundles.
15. The first step to building a tire is to assemble the inner liner, bead assemblies, ply fabric, sidewalls, and anti-chafing strips. Precision laser measuring devices are used by the skilled tire assemblers to ensure that every tire meets stringent design specifications. The tire then goes to another tire builder, who applies the belt and tread assemblies. At this point, this uncured assembly is called a "green tire." After being inspected inside and out, it is lubricated and sent to the curing press. Here, it is automatically inserted into a mold where a rubber bladder inflates, forcing the green tire to conform to the mold's tread and sidewall pattern. The tire is then cured under controlled pressure and temperature conditions to bond all of the components together.
16. After the curing process,...
16. After the curing process, tires are automatically checked for uniformity and balance to help ensure the smoothest ride possible. Even though automation is used throughout the tire-building and finishing processes, each finished tire is visually and physically inspected to make sure the tire is in perfect condition for the consumer. Finally, the tires are groomed, inspected, and labeled for warehousing and distribution.
Building a tire is one thing, but making it work is a whole different story. Computer-aided designs and experience certainly go a long way towards creating a functional tread pattern, but there's only one way to find out if a tire actually performs well, and that is through real-life testing.
For testing to be meaningful, it must be repeatable, and Cooper's Tire & Vehicle Test Center was built in 1999 just for that purpose.
Situated on 1,000 acres in Pearsall, Texas, the facility is probably larger than the town itself-and certainly more interesting. Carson Miller is the Operations Manager, supervising four very busy coworkers in a seemingly endless ritual of mounting tires, driving, measuring, checking data, driving, changing tires, and so on.
Surrounding a 16,500-square-foot main building are three huge asphalt tracks where things like handling and longevity can be observed, both wet and dry. Perhaps more importantly, at least from a four-wheeler's point of view, there are also carefully built and maintained trail-type obstacles, as well as a relatively long trail, and a small fleet of purpose-built 4x4s to evaluate the tires on.
Not unlike the Top Truck Challenge's Mini Rubicon, Cooper has a 100x16-foot rock course-except all the rocks are immovable. There are also mud holes, silt, off-camber dirt, a hill climb, pea gravel, sand, and a concrete slope with varying degrees of surface roughness, wet or dry. In other words, if you can find it on a trail (except for snow and ice), Cooper has most of it available in a controlled and repeatable environment, allowing refinement of its tires. Plus, of course, direct comparisons to the competition. And you thought that building the tires was the hard part.
-Jimmy Nylund
Making a tire is a complicated process, but the following chart breaks it down into 7 distinct steps.
1. Marketing concept development
2. Product development
3. Mold development and procurement
4. Prototype procurement
5. Prototype testing
6. Design certification
7. Manufacturing