Tokyo—The Yokohama Rubber Co., Ltd., today announced that it decided to mass-produce passenger car tires by using a new production system that is based on a novel idea of Fuji Seiko Co., Ltd. Yokohama Rubber is a member of a company group for the study of commercializing the new system and has been sharing the research work within the group.

The new tire production system makes it possible to produce high-precision tires with low distortion by directly connecting components manufacturing processes to the final building process. Furthermore, Fuji Seiko's improvements in rubber and metal processing techniques made the processes more simple and compact compared with existing systems.

As a result, the new system offers tire makers a wider variety of choice in selecting raw materials and component sizes that meet performance requirements. In addition, the tires produced with the new system attain an improved consistency in quality because it enables high-precision tire building.

While capitalizing on these outstanding features of the new system, Yokohama Rubber made the most of the performance of conventional tire materials and developed a new rubber mixture that meets performance requirements. These efforts brought about the new system capable of producing lightweight, highly rigid tires for passenger cars. When matched with a passenger car, tires produced with the new system showed a high-level achievement of both driving stability and comfort.

In order to promote the development of the new system, the group used Fuji Seiko's process technology, tire makers' tire development and production know-how, and Toyota Motor's tire performance evaluation expertise. The group plans to further improve the new system and continues research and development in order to achieve its goal of bringing a groundbreaking change to the tire production of the 21st Century.

In addition to its work as a member of the group, Yokohama Rubber continues R&D activities for the development of a new tire production system of its own. The company considers both systems to become basic systems for producing next-generation tires.