CO2 filled tires?

Ferrari did it:

http://www.wired.com/cars/coolwheels/magazine/16-06/ff_formulaone_sb

Also the passive dynamic aero is cool. Gets me thinking on passive dynamic or purely mechanical active aero devices...

Anyhow, CO2 vs. N2 vs. Good ol' air, GO!

I don't know. I think CO2 pressure changes are more dramatic for the same change in temperature than air and N2. Perhaps this is desirable when you are going to be doing somewhere on the order of 0 to 3 laps of qualifying / testing / and practice before a race and you want the pressure to build rapidly.

I imagine the reason you don't just fill them up right away with O2 hoping that pressure doesn't build that much (it won't in 2 laps) is that you DO want some heat in them and a great deal of heat is generated when a soft tire simply flexes.

Those F1's are probably the most beautiful creations that man has ever assembled (at least in recent years).

I win.

Sounds like it could be useful for autocrossing on R-compounds...

don't they put nitrogen in tires in extreamly cold climates?? Like driving across glaciers in Iceland?

A lot of places around here use nitrogen instead of air when you buy new tyres and have them installed

Jay Leno fills his car tires with nitrogen as well http://www.getnitrogen.org/n2study/video/leno.html

I'm a little slow but I'm not quite following how nitrogen in tires saves gas. Maybe we should look for ways to trap dangerous greenhouse gases in our tires so they are not in the atmosphere.

The nitrogen expands at a consistent rate as it warms. This leads to tires that are more consistent in pressure at all four corners.

With oxygen, the water in the air causes the tires to expand at varying rates.

Stefan

also nitro is slighty larger... which leads to less leaking out... or so i've read

Remember "air" is already 80% nitrogen, so there is not a huge difference with pure nitrogen. De-humidified air might have almost the same effect.

Considering that the atmosphere is already 78% nitrogen, I don't think the difference in expansion rate or leak rate will make enough difference on a street car that anyone will be able to tell the difference. Also, it's not as simple as just letting the air out and then filling them up again with N2 - outside of doing the whole procedure inside a vacuum chamber where you could evacuate all the air first, you'll have to fill and purge the tire several times to even get close to filling it completely with nitrogen. In my opinion the best thing about N2 is that it's dry, so you're not putting a lot of water vapor in the tire.

We used to use nitrogen at the track because its....

CHEAP!!!

Bringing the air compressor was a PITA, nitrogen is cheap and stable. We never noticed ANY difference in lap times, pressure consistency, etc... As a matter of fact me and my old boss still get a kick out of those nitrogen inflation commercials, since we were doing it so long ago simply because it was convenient.