maturing tires

DOUBLE TIRE GRIP REDUCE ROLLING FRICTION search for in bike tech!

"jim beam" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

i'm not interested in conjecture - just give me facts.

are you saying rubber does /not/ continue to cross-link over time?

jb

What amount of cross-linking is ideal for a given tire? Is it desirable to have an increased amount
of cross-linking for a tire from what the manufacturer intended during construction and at it's time
of "birth"? How does cross-linking affect traction, specifically wet traction?

Cheers?

Scott..

Quoted message said:

What amount of cross-linking is ideal for a given tire? Is it desirable to have an increased
amount of cross-linking for a tire from what the manufacturer intended during construction and at
it's time of "birth"? How does cross-linking affect traction, specifically wet traction?

briefly, you have polymers that are cross-linked to each other in the vulcanization process.
unvulcanized rubbers can be torn apart, vulcanized ones, within their design application, can't.

the "desired" amount depends on the properties you require. very roughly, hard is less sticky &
therefore less traction & less rolling resistance. the only way a consumer can practically affect
the rubber is to age it, if you are so inclined. i think you'll find that most of the "big"
manufacturers, the ones that spend the money on the research, design for a product to be used sooner
rather than later.

honestly, i wouldn't get too concerned about this. i don't age my tires any more. in the old days,
rubbers weren't as good as they are today, and the crazy race guys would do anything for some small
competitive advantage. if that meant using "old" rubber, they'd do it. today, multi-compound treads
negate that kind of guesswork. particularly when you can get them on special for $25 or less from
perform-super-bar.

jb.