US Congress Orders Rolling Resistance Information Campaign
Following some 12 years during which it blocked any attempt to introduce a tyre rolling resistance standard, the US Congress has responded to climbing fuel prices by ordering a consumer information programme by next year to inform consumers what to expect from tyres in terms of fuel economy. Since 1996 a congressional ban on adding such information to existing grading standards has been in place and renewed annually.
Continue ReadingZeus Launches New Website
As part of its new customer communications programme, Zeus has just launched a new and easier to navigate website that now provides real time information to OEM’s, tyre dealers and end users. Information featured on the site includes the latest tyre filling & flat proofing’ technologies, solutions, materials, products and services for large earthmoving, OTR and general industrial tyres’.
Continue ReadingSafety Scholar Video Contest Winners Named
Bridgestone/Firestone North American Tire has announced the winners of its second Safety Scholars video contest. Three grand-prize winners, plus one Critics’ Choice winner, were selected from 10 finalists through an online voting process that was open to the general public. BFNAT said that more than 10,000 online votes were collected. BFNAT said that all four winning videos will be used as public service commercials, and the winners receive a $5,000 college scholarship and a trip to the 2009 Chicago Auto Show. The winners were: • Danny Belkin of Rockville, Md., who warned about the dangers of behind-the-wheel cell phone use. • Ryan Massey, 18, from Laguna Niguel, Calif., used a first-person accident account as the basis for his seat-belt use video. • Sarah Wilson of Tampa featured a group of teenagers recounting a collision they were involved in as a result of text messaging while driving. • Critics’ Choice award was given to Angela Roscioli, 17, of Bethlehem, Pa., who contemplated the impact a collision near her home would affect the family of a young woman who was killed. (Tire Review/Akron)
Continue ReadingFifth Gear to Test Cooper Tyres
Cooper Tire’s acclaimed Zeon 2XS tyres will be put to the test on the small screen during the Fifth Gear programme that will air on 25 August. The ultra-high tyres will be featured on the Nissan R35 GTR of performance tuning company, GTC, as the car goes head to head with a Porsche 911 Turbo. GTC director Ben Linney’s GTR is the first example of the car to land on UK shores and, after tuning, pumps out 536bhp. The car was driven by Fifth Gear’s high-profile new ‘test driver’ during the head to head run at Welsh circuit, Anglesey, on 9 July. The car, and the Cooper Zeon 2XS tyres, perfect for the GTR thanks to their superior cornering and handling characteristics, performed impeccably during the test, according to Linney. “The car was driven hard all day,” explained Linney. “The driver was doing power slides and drifts in the wet weather, just feet away from the cliffs. The 2XS tyres lasted all day, and with very little wear. As they say, they ‘don’t give up a thing’.”
Continue ReadingMaywood Set to Turn the Nation Following Successful Trial
Following what the Maywood Equipment Group reports has been a very successful pilot scheme, the company has introduced a brand new product onto the market. The Maywood Car Turntable is an item suitable for small garages and workshops, as well as for other automotive related firms such as accident repairers and tyre bays. Maywood believes its simple operation will also attract businesses and homeowners situated in limited access locations where it is unsafe or inconvenient to reverse out of the premises.
Continue ReadingFirst Stop Branch in Pole Position at ‘Think You Can Drive’ Event
First Stop store, Steve Andrews Tyres was involved in the ‘Think You Can Drive’ event, held last weekend to raise awareness of safer driving on Cornish roads. Steve Andrews Tyres, part of Bridgestone’s First Stop network of tyre stores, teamed up with JBM maintenance to have a significant presence at the event at the Royal Cornwall Showground in Wadebridge. Together they hosted a large hospitality area which featured Bridgestone’s F1 simulator where young drivers could test their driving skills and pick up advice of road and tyre safety in return for a small charity donation. Now in its second year, the successful event was organised by the Rotary Club of Truro and supported by Devon and Cornwall Constabulary, Cornwall Fire Service and Cornwall County Council to encourage safer driving on Cornish roads. Local police, fire and ambulance services, along with the team from Steve Andrews Tyres, were on hand demonstrating the importance of road safety to local drivers with accident and skid pan simulators. The event culminated with a landing visit by both the police and air ambulance helicopters.
Continue ReadingTake Charge With Sealey
Sealey has introduced its new range of Compact Auto Maintenance Battery Chargers; simply plug in, turn on and the charger does the rest. These new chargers use inverter technology with micro-chip management to read the battery condition, adjusting their behaviour to optimise the battery charging process. They have multiple charging cycles with profiles designed to cram the battery with the maximum amount of charge, in the most effective time period, maintaining it at this level.
Continue ReadingVredestein Aims for Icy Markets with New Arctrac
Last year’s Winter Tyre Review (T&A, September 2007) featured three Vredestein tyres designed to withstand cold weather. The Wintrac Xtreme and its SUV cousin, the Wintrac 4 Xtreme courted the difficult market of the safety and style-conscious, being winter tyres designed in aesthetic partnership with Giugiaro Design – the Italian design engineering firm. The Quatrac 3, on the other hand, had designs on those wishing for the safety features of a cold tyre, but didn’t want the hassle of changing tyres come the chilly season. This year’s launch is a different animal: leaving aside the convenience and aesthetic concerns of other ranges, the Arctrac is for the committed winter tyre user in truly hostile conditions; a studded tyre with sturdy angular shoulders, whose natural territory is upon the very heavy frosts of countries surrounding the Arctic Circle, such as Canada, Russia and the Scandinavian nations.
Continue ReadingKingsway Tyres Educates Norfolk in Tyre Safety
Kingsway Tyres, a First Stop dealership, has been out and about in its home county of Norfolk helping to educate the community in tyre safety. The Royal Norfolk Show and a special event that took place at Asda two weeks later in Norwich played host to the company’s roadshow, working in conjunction with Bridgestone’s worldwide “Think Before You Drive” campaign. Research shows that 90 per cent of drivers do not know the correct pressure of their tyres, so the events represented an excellent opportunity to encourage drivers to think more seriously about the state of their vehicles’ wheels. The roadshow, which was visited by hundreds of Norfolk residents, featured the Ferrari Formula One car and an F1 simulator, accessed through a charitable donation. As a result £450 was raised for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, while Asda-based fundraising raised a further £331.38 for The Norfolk & Norwich University Hospital Respiratory Unit.
Continue ReadingContinental Reveals Top Ten Bumpiest UK Roads
Continental has released the results of a survey of British drivers to find the bumpiest roads in the UK. Station Road in Scholes – a town east of Leeds – received the dubious honour of first place in the survey. Phrases like “giant crater”, “dangerous to cyclists and drivers” and “like the surface of the moon” (perhaps not that last one) abounded in the survey, reporting the state of Station Road. The crater in question rivals that featured in the Monorail episode of The Simpsons into which Marge drove, representing a depth greater than the height of the legal maximum height of a speed hump. The criteria for inclusion in the list comprised the length of time road had been in poor condition, how many times it had been reported to local authorities, the potential damage it could cause to vehicles, potential danger to road users, and the size of potholes/damaged areas in relation to road. All of the roads were verified by the campaigning website fillthathole.org.uk. According to a recent Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey, there are currently over one million potholes across the country, but worryingly there is a shortfall in the budgets needed to fix them of over £1 billion and an 11 year backlog of maintenance work. Since January 2008 alone, 4,217 new hazards have been reported to the aforementioned pothole campaigning site.
Continue ReadingGoodyear Seeks Exemption From US Recall
In spite of determining that some 82,000 tyres produced between 2007 and March 2008 featured sidewall labelling not fully in compliance with US safety standards, Goodyear has petitioned the National Highway Transport Safety Authority (NHTSA) to exempt the products from a recall. The tyres in question incorrectly identify the number of plies in the tread as being ‘3 polyester and 2 steel’ rather than their actual ‘2 polyester and 2 steel’ manufacture, an error Goodyear believes to be inconsequential to vehicle safety as the tyres were correctly manufactured with the intended number of plies.
Continue ReadingGoodyear Beefs Up Heavy Load Range
Following a surge in demand for tyres with heavier load carrying capacities, Goodyear has unveiled a newly upsized Sure Grip Implement. From August 2008 the 12.5/80-18 size Implement will offer support to heavier machine loads, increasing from a 10 ply rating to a 14 ply rating. Goodyear is the first tyre manufacturer to feature a 14 ply rated tyre as leading competitors only offer a maximum of 12 ply. The increase will allow the new tyre a maximum nominal carrying capacity of 3000kg which represents an increase of 1140kg across the axle. The tyre is designed primarily for soft underfoot conditions, in which greater traction is a must. The new tyre will be featured as OE fitment on agricultural machinery manufactured by Case New Holland and rough terrain specialists, Manitou.
Continue ReadingHercules Increases its European Focus
Hercules Tire International’s Essen exhibit featured several new products from among its stable of brands. New lines debuting at the show included the Hercules Terra Trac A/T & MR IV SUV, Merit All Country A/T and Ironman Radial A/P. According to Hercules Corporate Business Development Officer, Joe Recchia, “Never before have we launched so many new lines at once, in our Flagship brand, as well as in Merit and Ironman. We believe our product line-up at Essen clearly shows our commitment in mold investment and in providing our customers the latest in tread design and product range. By partnering with an array of world-class manufacturers, only Hercules can offer a second-to-none combination of quality and availability.”
Continue ReadingHangzhou Zhongce Celebrates 50 Years
Despite an absence of specific festivities, Hangzhou Zhongce Rubber marked a significant milestone during the Reifen Essen show – this year the Chinese company has been in existence for half a century. Established in 1958 in Hangzhou city, in China’s east coast Zhejiang Province, the former state owned enterprise produces a range of rubber related products. The company’s first tyre (for bicycles) was manufactured ten years ago, and since then Hangzhou Zhongce has increased its range substantially. A company representative reported that Hangzhou Zhongce now produces more than one thousand sizes of automotive tyre, with annual output for this segment an impressive 27 million pieces, of which 22 million are radials. The representative added the company aims to achieve sales (for all products) of US$2.7 billion by 2010. Amongst the products on display at the exhibition were familiar brand names, including Goodride and Westlake. Truck and bus tyre products, an important market for Hangzhou Zhongce, featured prominently.
Continue ReadingGoodyear and Agricultural University Create Innovation Award
Goodyear has collaborated with Shropshire-based Harper Adams University in introducing an award for agricultural innovation. Having provided high performance tyres to the agricultural sector in the UK for 70 years, Goodyear have been engaged with new technology in the sector for some time, making them perhaps the most appropriate company to present such an award. The award has been introduced to provide a suitable showcase for the knowledge and development of Britons in agriculture, and is looking to find the 2008 Goodyear Farming Innovator. The prize, which will include £3,500-worth of Goodyear farm tyres, is set to be awarded by Harper Adams from a shortlist of three contenders chosen by Goodyear from entries on the mygoodyear website.
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