DUNLOP RACING TYRES
Optimum construction where tread compounds are laid up at the right angles for precise performance
entirely of natural rubber. ‘In my department, we tend
Abaqus and Simulia from Dassault Systèmes -- comprehensive modelling of rubber behavior including viscoelasticity and automatic creation of 3D treaded tyre models from 2-D cross-sections
where Abaqus and Simulia from Dassault Systèmes comes in. A huge amount of intellectual endeavour by hundreds of software developers over several decades has made Abaqus probably the best non-linear analysis code available. As important as the
developers are, it’s the technical partnerships with tyre companies that make the software what it is today. Companies like Dunlop Motorsport, who are continually pushing the technology to its limits to provide the best service for their racing partners, are essential in the development of the simulation software. With the high profile of
Bridgestone, Pirelli, Michelin and other premium tyre brands, it’s easy to overlook the major contribution Dunlop has made to motorsport. But Dunlop is a major player, particularly as a technical partner to BMW in GT Racing, in the American Le Mans Series (ALMS), Nürburgring 24 Hours and the World Endurance Championship (WEC). But it’s not until you look
around a tyre plant that you realise how manually intensive
to concentrate on GT and Sportscars in GT2, GT3, LMP1, LMP2,’ says David Meenan, a design engineer with Dunlop Motorsport at Fort Dunlop in Birmingham, UK. ‘We have some development partners that have commercial deals but, because there is such a demand for our product, it walks out of the factory on its own. We don’t have to embark on huge marketing campaigns, it sells itself.’
Laying up the carcass layer by layer by hand on the tyre building machine
tyre production is. Preconceptions of automated processes with tyres rolling off conveyor belts in their thousands are way off the
The factory in Birmingham
resembles the dark Satanic Mills of old, due to the carbon black in the air and that unmistakable
“It’s easy to overlook the
major contribution Dunlop has made to motorsport “
mark. At Dunlop Motorsport, each tyre is virtually hand made, albeit with the aid of huge machines and sophisticated background compound chemistry processes.
‘rubber’ smell that takes you straight back to your first visit to a bicycle shop. Many other preconceptions are false too, notably that tyres are made
HIGHLY TUNED In developing a race tyre, Dunlop starts with slick tyres. It might look easy because there is no tread involved, but it’s not. A lot depends on the construction of the tyre and a range of compounds used. ‘Sometimes we take seven or eight different compounds to an event,’ says Meenan. ‘Some cars are highly tuned to certain conditions that require certain types of tyres, and then there are the more general products for the less highly tuned cars, which just have a soft, medium or hard compound combination. In between all that, for our development partners we would have smaller gaps in the performance of each compound.’ The word ‘compound’ is
confusing here as, when talking about finished tyres, it is used to differentiate between actual tyres. As a constituent in the manufacturing process it refers
May 2012 •
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