Originally Posted by
canam73
Wait, I read somewhere that vulcanizing takes the Elvis out of bicycle tires. So there's that.
So tires score low on the E-Meter!
Ok, then maybe we can get somewhere on the chemistry side.
From my time with Continental I got a good dose of what goes into compounding. One of the things that seemed to be driving them (during the introduction of Black Chili) was the size of the molecules that comprised Black Chili and how they were much smaller than Silica based compounds used previously.
Once bonded to the casing it meant that the limiting factor to deflection wasn't the tread compound but the casing (and the compounds there). As I understood it, it meant that during deflection less energy was lost because the smaller molecules allowed the material to move more freely giving better adhesion and lower rolling resistance.
Thoughts?