A vehicle comprising wheels having tires can be monitored to obtain information regarding the vehicle, including information regarding the wheels, such as an indication of a physical state of a tire and/or other component of the wheel based on at least 3D recognition and/or 2D recognition of image data of the tire and/or other wheel component.

Provided is a tire testing apparatus capable of accurately and easily measuring a load which a tire receives from a road surface. The tire testing apparatus includes a plate buried in a road surface with which a tire is in contact, at least one ground-contact-force sensor measuring a ground-contact force during a contact of the tire, and at least one plate sensor measuring a load applied to the plate. According to the tire testing device, a ground-contact force of the tire can be measured by the ground-contact-force sensor and a load which the tire applies to the plate can be measured by the plate sensor.

A tire management method with which specific information of a tire can be acquired at arbitrary timing in a manufacturing process of a vehicle is provided. The tire management method is a method of managing a tire group including a plurality of tires 1 on each of which a first mark M1 and a second mark M2 are provided on specific positions of a side surface, the method including: a step of associating, with respect to each of the tires included in the tire group, specific information of the tire and mark positional information (12, r1, and r2) related to positions of the marks M1 and M2, and recording these into a computer 2; a step of acquiring mark positional information of a tire selected from the tire group; and a step of acquiring, by using the computer 2, specific information associated with the previously-acquired mark positional information.

The invention relates to a method for determining at least one tyre-specific characteristic of a tyre (15) of a motor vehicle (1), in which an area of the tyre (15) of the motor vehicle (1) is captured by means of at least one vehicle-side camera (3, 6), wherein a tyre wall (16) of the tyre (15) with a tyre inscription (19) is captured as the area by means of the at least one camera (3, 6), and the tyre inscription (19) is identified by means of an evaluation device (13) and the at least one tyre-specific characteristic is determined on the basis of the tyre inscription (19). The invention also relates to a driver assistance system (2) and a motor vehicle (1).

In an embodiment, a system for wear monitoring, includes a wear surface, a metallic reflector embedded in the wear surface, a radio-wave transmitter, and a radio-wave receiver. The metallic reflector reflects radio waves transmitted by the radio-wave transmitter for detection by the radio wave receiver. Attenuation of the radio waves between transmission by the radio-wave transmitter and detection by the radio-wave receiver indicates a degree of wear of the wear surface.

A device for rotating a tire includes a fixed support, a driving belt, a plurality of first pulleys, and at least one second pulley. The driving belt has a contact face for contacting an annular part of the tire, and the driving belt enables rotation of the tire. The first pulleys are mounted on the support and are in abutment with the driving belt on a side opposite to the contact face in order to press the contact face radially against the annular part of the tire. The at least one second pulley is in abutment with the contact face of the driving belt and is mounted for translational movement on the support in order to locally space the contact face apart from the annular part of the tire.

Data representing a ground contact time of a tire is transmitted from a tire side device, and received by a vehicle side device to calculate the ground contact time of the tire, to thereby calculate a ground contact length of the tire at that time. In a situation where a tire air pressure may change such as a tire exchange, the ground contact length at that time is set as a reference ground contact length, and a determination reference value is set on the basis of the reference ground contact length. As a result, the relative determination reference value corresponding to the tire type can be set, and a variation of the reduction rate of the tire air pressure when it is determined that the tire air pressure is reduced can be reduced. As a result, the reduction in the tire air pressure can be detected with high precision regardless of the tire type.

A tire testing device having a rotary drive unit that rotationally drives a tire; a load drum that has an outer peripheral surface that can come into contact with the tire being rotationally driven; a drum support mechanism that supports the load drum and relatively moves the load drum such that the tire and the outer peripheral surface of the load drum come into contact and separate; a shape sensor that detects a surface shape of the tire being rotationally driven; a drive control unit that controls the operation of the rotary drive unit, the drum support mechanism, and the shape sensor; a registration unit that stores information related to the tire test; and an input reception unit that receives, and registers, in the registration unit, information related to the tire test entered by a user prior to the tire test being conducted.

A tire testing apparatus for testing a tire comprises a loading means for the tire (17), a measuring head (20, 22, 24) which is movable relative to the tire (17), and lower bearing elements (7) on which the tire (17) can be positioned in vertical position. To improve such tire testing apparatus, the tire testing apparatus comprises upper bearing elements (8) which are movable relative to the lower bearing elements (7) and which together with the lower bearing elements (7) form a holder for the tire (17). (FIG. 8c)

A computer-implemented method for calculating a tire wear rate of a vehicle, the method comprising obtaining technical data of at least one tire of a vehicle obtaining technical data of the vehicle, obtaining data of at least one in-operational measurement of at least one property of at least one tire of the vehicle; and calculating a tire wear rate based at least in part on the obtained technical data of the at least one tire of the vehicle, the obtained technical data of the vehicle and the obtained data of the at least one in-operational measurement of at least one property of the at least one tire of the vehicle according to a self-tuning mathematical tire wear model.