Tire Tech Expo: AI a dominant theme in Hanover

Hanover, Germany - Artificial intelligence (AI) and its application to tire R&D, manufacturing and supply-chain processes was major focus of the presentations at  this week's Tire Technology Expo conference. 

A conference-stream, titled ‘Advances in manufacturing, including AI, Industry 4.0 and sustainability’, attracted papers on cutting-edge developments at automation vendors, equipment suppliers and tire makers. 

In a leadership talk, titled ‘Transforming production with AI’, Harm Voortman, president and CEO, VMI Group explored how AI and machine learning (ML) are now starting to revolutionise tire manufacture.

Voortman explained how the introduction of these technologies on already highly automated tire-making machines is leading to significantly reduced scrap, lower energy costs and higher-quality tires.  

Among other stand-out presentations was a talk on ‘How to build better tires with AI, by Mithun Nagabhairava, senior manager, data science at Kalypso, a Rockwell Automation business. 

Citing case studies, Nagabhairava described how the application of AI could generate reductions as high as 45% in downtime while also significantly increasing productivity levels at global tire manufacturers.  

In another top-line paper, Tim Bommer, R&D engineer, HF Mixing Group detailed the application of an AI-based algorithm to optimise the final mixing of rubber.

According to Bommer, the development has involved leading-edge work in the mathematical modelling of different stages of the mixing processes.

Meanwhile ‘AI applications in tire R&D and manufacturing’ was the topic of an Apollo Tyres presentation, given jointly by Arjun Balasubramanian, group manager, OE product development, passenger vehicle and Hitesh Joshi, head, passenger vehicle, R&D APMEA. 

The Apollo managers explained how AI is being used in areas, such as material design and production: applying large test data-sets to predict tire behaviour and optimise process performance. 

We will report further on these developments on ERJ On-line and in European Rubber Journal magazine...