High Frequency Dynamic Behaviour of Smooth and Patterned Passenger Car Tyres
Journal article, 2004
Most traditional tyre models concern the low and middle frequency ranges. For improved accuracy in tyre/road
interaction models it is necessary to include higher frequencies. Often only the radial direction is included, although
the tangential direction may be important, especially studying stick slip motion in the contact between tyre
and road surface. Designing accurate and efifcient models requires insight into the behaviour of the tyre structure
at higher frequencies to make the models as complete as necessary without creating tools that are computationally
too costly. To add insight to this area, experimental studies were done on four different tyres with the same
internal design but with different tread patterns. Point mobilities were measured and compared with two different
tyre models, a two-layer plate model based on the elastic field equations and an orthotropic plate model. The
results of this study underline the importance of the local deformation when there are forces that act with small
excitation areas on the tread. Adequate consideration of the tread properties in the tyre/road interaction models
is thus of extreme importance to obtain the correct local contact force distribution. This is most important for the
tangential driving point mobility. Tread patterns are shown mainly to modify the flexural stiffness in comparison
to smooth tyres, while block resonances are not expected to be located in the frequency range in which tyre/road
noise is important.