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near-fossil-free rubber tires

Andrew Beckford, May 2023, page-11, MOTOR TREND, ' New Tire Made From Soybean Oil, Rice Husks, and Pine Resin,' reports on Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. R&D involving sustainable tire manufacture, which nearly takes petroleum completely out of the tire manufacturing process.
Seventeen sustainable ingredients are involved.
So lets stop burning petroleum as soon as possible so we can fill the Pacific with worn out tires, 'n I'll be able to make the drive from L.A. to Honolulu!

i'm favorable to replacing petroleum and other synthetic materials on tires for something else. IIRC Continental was testing a dandelion-based rubber too.

thedrive.com: Why Goodyear’s Illuminated Tires Were Way Ahead of Their Time

Quote:

https://www.thedrive.com/content-b/m...yeartires2.jpg

William Larson, a chemist at Goodyear, worked together with fellow employee Anthony Finelli to create a polyurethane compound called neothane, a material which allowed Goodyear to build a tubeless, cordless tire which could be dyed in a plethora of pigments.
....
At this point, you're probably wondering what happened to the tires. If they were so cool and well-received, why didn't they appear on more vehicles? Aside from cost being the largest inhibitor (and ultimately what was responsible for killing the project), the tires weren't exactly practical. A few miles of road driving would render illumination useless, as road debris and wear would cover the synthetic tires in soot.

Then came the safety issues. The compound did not provide enough grip in rainy weather, nor did they hold up to hard braking due to the relatively low 250-degree pouring temperature of the compound. Flat spots would have become a large problem. So in the name of function over form, the project did not come to fruition after ten years of development.

Barris' Golden Sahara II was the only car to get a set. ....twice.

https://www.thedrive.com/content-b/m...13-sahara1.jpg

Quote:

https://silodrome.com › golden-sahara-ii
The Golden Sahara II - A Self-Driving Custom Car From The 1950s - Silodrome
The Golden Sahara II is remembered as one of the most important custom cars of the 1950s - and it only came to be because George Barris and a friend accidentally drove a brand new 1953 Lincoln Capri Hardtop under the back of a hay truck - guillotining the roof off.

I wouldn't really expect polyurethane to have a decent performance when used on tires.

Polyurethane wheels revolutionized skateboarding.

Still need to heat the rubber up to around 350F to cure it. Probably not going to do that with sunlight.

'vulcanization temperatures'

Renewable electric power and electric induction heating elements, just like in service today.

Quote:

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

Probably not going to do that with sunlight.

'Splain me, Lucy. [a Dezi Arnaz would say]

Quote:

https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Concentrated_solar_power
Concentrated solar power - Wikipedia
Concentrated solar power (CSP, also known as concentrating solar power, concentrated solar thermal) systems generate solar power by using mirrors or lenses to concentrate a large area of sunlight into a receiver. Electricity is generated when the concentrated light is converted to heat (solar thermal energy), which drives a heat engine (usually a steam turbine) connected to an electrical power ...

Quote:

Originally Posted by freebeard (Post 681948)

Polyurethane wheels revolutionized skateboarding.

Those are rigid, don't need to be aired up :D

Can see it now: "Ok guys it's cloudy. Punch out and go home, no work today"

That's a pretty fancy tire sidewall.

Still no mention of orange peels?

Quote:

https://www.popularmechanics.com › cars › hybrid-electric › a7593 › the-science-behind-yokohamas-orange-oil-tires-8146348
The Science Behind Yokohama's Orange Oil Tires - Popular Mechanics
The key: new technology using oil derived from orange peels to displace some of the petroleum that's typically used in tires. Tires, like any manufactured product, are a compromise. In this...

The problem with using sunlight to cure tires is even a smaller tire operation where they run say a dozen car and pickup truck tire mold presses is still going to use hundreds of millions to a billion BTUs of natural gas per day.
Then if the flow or temperature of the steam fall out side of a narrow window of parameters that tire is junked.