With the "30-60" strategy, Linglong Tire actively embraces and changes, and keeps exploring bio-based material research.
Vegetable oil replaces petroleum-based plasticizers
Linglong Tire has successfully applied vegetable oil to replace petroleum-based plasticizers in tire production as early as 2012, which has greatly improved the proportion of renewable materials in rubber and reduced the dependence on petrochemical operating oil. The modified vegetable oil plasticized lubricating system applied to winter tire tread formula has obtained excellent performance on ice and snow, and the technology declared as Shandong Province Science and Technology Innovation Achievement - "Development of Super High Performance Winter Tire Tread Formula for Europe" was evaluated as "International Advanced Technology" by experts.
Dandelion rubber research keeps pace with Europe and America
In 2012, Linglong Tire carried out research on dandelion natural rubber. 2015 Linglong Tire and Beijing University of Chemical Technology jointly initiated the establishment of "Dandelion Rubber Industry Technology Innovation Strategic Alliance", which attracted 20 units including universities, enterprises and research institutes to participate. The work covers from germplasm creation, high-yield cultivation, high-efficiency extraction, downstream application, and comprehensive development of the whole industry chain. After nearly 10 years of continuous efforts, China's dandelion rubber research has been transformed from following to keeping pace with Europe and the United States..
Natural rubber chain grafting modification technology has excellent carbon reduction effect
Biobased materials are new materials made from renewable biomass, which can grow and breathe carbon dioxide. Through planting → absorbing carbon dioxide → using → releasing carbon dioxide → planting → absorbing carbon dioxide infinite cycle to achieve a dynamic carbon balance, so that tires have a "growth factor".
Linglong Tire has increased the exploration and research of low carbon bio-based materials, and independently developed the application of natural polymer elastomer with leaded branches in tire manufacturing, and made a technical breakthrough in September 2021, completing the development of ultra-high bio-based tread formula technology and forming a complete technical system.
The formula adopts natural rubber leaded graft modification technology, which introduces special graft modification technology while using natural rubber biotechnology, and this technology can give tires many excellent properties. The chain-priming technology can fully improve the interaction between rubber macromolecular chains and high surface energy nanoparticles such as silica nanomaterials in the formulation, and improve the dispersion of nanoparticles to overcome the problem of poor dispersion between traditional rubber and polar fillers.
In addition, the chain priming technology can be used as a reaction active point to further modify the polymer, so as to obtain a variety of new functional materials, which can fully reflect the reliance on the strong physical bonding energy of the material itself to achieve the combination between different boundary phase materials in the formulation, reducing the reliance on chemical bonding, and realizing the real sense of green low-carbon tires. This formula has been tested by BETA through the biobased content 14C tracking detection technology, and the biobased carbon content in this tread formula of Linglong has reached more than 90%, which truly realizes the use of low carbon and renewable green technology in tires, and can reduce more than 90% of carbon dioxide emission in tire manufacturing.
In addition, this tread adopts modified vegetable oil plasticized lubricating system, which ensures renewable material source while achieving full integration with rubber polymer and nano-filler, increasing rubber molecular flexibility, realizing instant grip performance under different temperatures, and greatly improving tire safety performance. The use of ultra-high bio-based content tread formula than normal conventional tread in tire performance can reduce rolling resistance by 8%, anti-slip index can be increased by 5%, tire wear mileage can be increased by 10%.