Michelin is to unveil a ‘anti-landmine’ tyre at the EuroSatory Exhibition (Paris, June 16-20, 2014). The product is designed to meet the needs of the French Army and defence systems manufacturer MBDA. The tyre maker has engineered the anti-landmine tyre to exert less ground pressure than a man’s footfall – when fitted to a vehicle weighing over 7.5 tonnes! It is capable of clearing safe pathways through minefields without setting off explosions.
A standard armoured reconnaissance vehicle exerts a ground pressure of 5 kg/sq.cm. Equipped with the Michelin LX PSI 710/75 R 34 anti-landmine tyres, each weighing 200kg, the roughly 7.5-tonne SOUVIM II vehicle applies a ground pressure of just 360 g/sq.cm. That’s less than an 80-kg walking human, which exerts about 660 g/sq.m of ground pressure per footfall, and – for anecdotal purposes – even less than a 2.5kg rabbit, which applies 450 g/sq.cm to the soil.