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We are looking for something to fill our go-cart tyres so that they become harder to puncture.
I know Team Tornado use something to fill their tyres but I cant find any info on their, rather massive, homepage.
Any tips on what is suitable to use, anyone?
I think the Stinger team used foam pipe insulation (available from plumbers supplies) as it was seen coming out of one of their tryes in a RW fight a while ago (dont know the opponent or series)
Also I think expanded polyeurathene (cant spell!) foam...the aerosol type has been used.
There is also a substance called green slime here: http://www.bicyclemagic.com/products.php?plid=m2b49s92p776http://www.bicyclemagic.com/products...d=m2b49s92p776 for bike tryes. Not sure if it would work on a large hole from a powerful axe etc.
I have never used any of these (we have solid tyres) so have no idea how effective any are but the info may be of help.
Tom
Stinger vs Pussycat in a Robot Wars Extreme 1 All Stars match, they dont call me a genius for nothing :wink:
upholsteryfoam, cut out in a tight filling ring, put into the tires can save the day.
Markus....
Extract from Tornados diary.
14/5/01 - Ordered the furniture foam for the wheels from TS Covers in Peterborough. Cut the silver steel for the new removable spikes at work at lunch. Spent the evening working on the weapons motor cradle and chassis mounts. Planned the side bars, stand and trolley.
Foam pipe insulation, green slime :proud:lol, upholstery foam, furniture foam...
So much to chose from, so little time. Thanks for the advice though guys. Ill try to find the products youre talking about (though green slime might cause some laughing :)) here in Sweden.
Will probably go for the lightest stuff first then the cheapest. Building HW:s is a heavy and costly business...but you all know that already:).
Ghostbusters anybody ??? slimer = green slime GHOST ASG
Make sure you dont buy air drying foam...once its in the wheel there wont be any air presant...so youll be left with a tyre full of goo:sad:
Dave moulds
Team Turbine
I filled Hannials kart tyres with poly foam. The advice is to add some water inside the tyre b4 filling with p/foam, this apparently activates the foam.
When I was at the ideal home exhibition last year,there was a guy displaying car puncture stuff, he was sticking this spike through the tyre, time after time, and it was sealing it great, but he said it wouldnt cope with a slash type puncture, so Id guess theyd be of limited use in robot tyres
If you go to ATS (the industrial division) they can send them away to be filled with a rubbery compound to make them puncture proof.
I have a pair of kart rears treated in this way , BUT they are sooo heavy I cant use them, probably about 5 kg a piece now.
The cost was comparable to buying puncture proof tyres from technobots, I think they came out at about £25 a tyre (depending on tyre size... these are wide rears, narrower rears or fronts would be cheaper) plus a tube plus obviously VAT... didnt manage to wangle any freebies on that deal...
I dont think Ill be using them, so make me an offer... trouble is postage will probably make it not worth while.
Thanks, but I got shudders from reading that weight :proud:. 5 kg a tyre is simply to much...even if they probably could take a direct hit from a bazooka :proud:.
that green slime, is available in halfords and bike shops, its only good for holes up to 5mm big, i know this because i have used it on my bike. So i suppose its not good for robots.
Danny
Markus,
I had rear go-kart tyres on my last robot, and found that I could run them with vitually no air pressure for a 100kg robot. So I never filled them with the foam that I had bought, and that certainly saved weight. I did make sure that the tyres were fairly well protected within the body of the robot. You may not need the foam. Check out your robot first. (Obviously you may need significant air pressure in the tyres to achieve your design surface clearance, but otherwise.....)
Jeremy
Ok, thanks Jeremy. We will wait with the filling till we know how the robot acts with different tyrepressures.
BTW...any good advice on how to best separate the wheel from the hub? Its really tight and I dont want to ruin the only pair of tyres we have :proud:.
Markus,
It wasnt a problem that I came across. Im not sure whether you are having trouble taking the tyre off the wheel hub, or the taking the wheel hub off the axle boss.
I used a split nylon wheel hub - very light and strong, and an aluminium axle boss that gripped the axle and was driven through a keyway. Everything fitted together and came apart easily.
For the new robot, using smaller wheels, I machined down the boss to fit, and drilled new holes in the split hub to fit the boss.
You can buy foam inserts for split rim hubs off the shelf at a good go-kart shop, they dont weigh to much either as they are ment for racing!
We use plumbing insulation, but you really have to push hard to get it in tight enough to pack out the tyre. You can rivet the tyre to the wheel hub I guess....
Does anyone know any good online go-kart tyre suppliers? I tried looking yesterday and apart from 300 links to Tornados site, I only found one - very expensive.
Try http://www.faikartline.comwww.faikartline.com , I buy my nylon hubs from them and delivery is next day.
Why is it so important to fill kart tyres anyway? They are hardly ideal for robots - and the nice flat floors we have dont require the compliance of a pneumatic tyre.
We use the tread section of kart tyres, but cut off the sidewalls and bolt the treads straight onto our wheels - These cannot be punctured now! Better still, the fancy stuff Ed uses on his Storm 2 wheels.
Its all a matter of money. But vulcanising metal with Vulcalon or similar stuff is very good, if you can afford it.