Smithers Rapra held its first Tire Technology Symposium in China, an event designed to bring the Chinese tire industry together to share technical knowledge, regulatory expertise and business insight. The symposium featured more than 70 technical experts from companies throughout the industry supply chain, including automotive OEMs, tire manufacturers and retailers.
James Popio, vice president of Smithers Rapra’s North American operations, kicked off the day of technical sessions with a history of Force and Moment testing. The session was designed to help fellow technologists understand the reasons behind such measurements and why they are a critical input to vehicle design.
“These measurements are made to allow vehicle makers to ride and drive tires in the virtual world. In addition, it allows them to do chassis, control and suspension design,” Popio said. “For automotive OEMs and tire manufacturers alike, understanding how tire dynamics change with different driving conditions provides key data that can be used for performance measurements and is essential to creating tire models.”
The sessions continued with discussions by several industry experts on topics providing insight for Chinese manufacturers looking to enter and succeed in global markets. They included:
• Tire Modeling for vehicles presented by Dean Tener, business development manager, Smithers Rapra
• Regulations presented by Popio
• Rolling Resistance Testing and Data Analysis presented by Henry He, lead test engineer, Smithers Rapra