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but you give up a lot of control that you would otherwise have with a dedicated spring/damper system
What control would you be looking for? The job in this context is to keep the rubber on the road - and the tyre does this when the contact patch is massive and the pressure is comparatively low; it just deforms locally with little impact
on the overall pressure of the tyre because the volume is so large relative to the deformation. So I’m not sure what a rebound / compression system would add.It’s not that the tyre is doing the suspension systems job, it’s doing a different job that you wouldn’t design the suspension system to do because you can’t really square the circle where it needs to deal with two opposing types of input whilst remaining light, predictable and reliable.
Would genuinely be interested of hearing any concrete cases where having the tyre doing more suspension work than the suspension system itself.
Go karts have no suspension systems at all :)
Howard-
Go karts have no suspension systems at all :)
Isn't your back doing the suspension work there?
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Do you?
Yes, spring & damping rates are basically just a function of tyre pressure in the tyre are they not? Given that this varies as the tyre temp changes, and the rate of change is variable dependant on tyre type and tyre wear. You can surely have more control with a dedicated spring damper system, where you can keep the parameters fixed if you want, or if you want them to change, you can have them change in a predictable, repeatable manner.
When you are talking about high frequency / low impact what does a compression and rebound system designed to ‘manage’ those impacts actually add, except complexity and weight?
Consistent, controllable responses.
It’s not that the tyre is doing the suspension systems job, it’s doing a different job that you wouldn’t design the suspension system to do because you can’t really square the circle where it needs to deal with two opposing types of input whilst remaining light, predictable and reliable.
You've lost me on that bit to be honest.
Go karts have no suspension systems at all
Yep, adding a suspension system to a kart would probably not be a worthwhile idea. Not sure how much of that is weight, and how much is cost. Still, can't really see a case where moving work away from a suspension system to be handled by the tyres would be beneficial though.
Jaap
mmccarthy
Sure it's easier to slap a tyre on there, but you give up a lot of control that you would otherwise have with a dedicated spring/damper system to a tyre where you have a single parameter that controls all the characteristics of the system. That single parameter also changes as you heat up the tyres, the rate of change also varies with both tyre type and tyre wear.
Would genuinely be interested of hearing any concrete cases where having the tyre doing more suspension work than the suspension system itself.
I'm no expert, but the majority of my final year in uni was focussed on suspension systems design so I'm not clueless on the subject either!