New CenTiRe-Funded Research to Advance Tire Testing Standards and Automation

We’re excited to announce the launch of a newly funded CenTiRe research project titled:

Optimal Modal Testing and Automated Identification of Meridional Bending Modes of Radial Tires. This three-year initiative will be led by Professor Rakesh Kapania of Virginia Tech, a long-standing contributor to the Center for Tire Research (CenTiRe) and an expert in structural dynamics and vibration analysis.

Why This Research Matters:

While modal testing procedures for many tire vibration modes—such as torsional, lateral, and circumferential modes—have been standardized (e.g., SAE J2710), Meridional Bending Modes (MBMs), also known as crown bending modes, remain largely uncharacterized and unstandardized. These MBMs are critical because they play a major role in how vibrations transfer from the tire to the vehicle spindle—directly affecting ride comfort and noise performance.

Project Goals & Innovations:

Professor Kapania’s team will develop experimental procedures to identify MBMs, extracting key modal data such as resonance frequencies and damping ratios with high accuracy and efficiency. The process will dramatically reduce time and effort compared to current testing methods.

Key innovations include:

- Development of optimal sensor placement strategies and targeted excitation regimes to clearly distinguish MBMs—something rarely achieved in previous studies.

- Automation of Digital Signal Processing (DSP), Frequency Response Function (FRF) analysis, and modal data identification.

- Integration of all developed methods into a Python-based software application to streamline and automate the entire testing workflow.

A New Industry Standard:

The project’s primary deliverable will be a comprehensive technical document—similar to SAE J2710 but specifically tailored for MBMs—that could serve as a new industry guideline for tire modal testing.

This project underscores CenTiRe’s continued commitment to bridging academic research and real-world tire industry needs, and we’re thrilled to support cutting-edge work that has the potential to transform tire testing methodology.

Stay tuned for updates as the project progresses—and be sure to follow us for more insights into the future of tire research!