India To Get New and Safer Tyre Norms – MoRTH

The Indian Ministry of road and transport has recently proposed new, safer and more stringent norms for cars, buses and truck tyres. These new norms will require tyres to be sold in India to meet a certain benchmark, including rolling resistance, wet grip, and rolling sound emission.

It will be mandatory for all domestic manufacturers and importers to follow these proposed norms.

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Although, India is not the first country to implement such norms. These tyre norms already exist n several European markets since 2016. These norms are mainly towards improving the performance and safety of tyres.

When will the new norms be mandated?

• According to the proposed draft issued by MoRTH, these new norms will be mandated from October 2021.
• However, all the existing tyre models must adhere to these norms by October 2022.

• It is also believed that a star rating will also be introduced to measure the safety ratings for any given tyre.
• CEAT is the only tyre manufacturer with its label system and SecuraDrive range.

• These new norms also aim to bring close to the strict ones already imposed in countries like the US, Europe, Japan and China.

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But what about the BIS markings?

• According to experts, the BIS marking does not hold the same accountability these new norms might hold.
• The suggested BIS markings are given under the Tyre Quality Control Order.
• Although the designated BIS mark does convey the exact information that might help the customer purchase the correct tyre.

The New Tyre Regulations

As said earlier, the tyre companies must follow the tyre norms to sell them in India from October 2021. This is where the companies will adhere to certain limits for rolling resistance, wet grip and rolling sound emission.

Let’s look at what are these tyre technologies.

Rolling Resistance

When a person drives a vehicle and pushes the accelerator paddle, they primarily transfer energy into the tyres to move the vehicle. And because of the good friction, the car moves. But before getting going, the tyre experiences a little hesitation before getting in motion. Well, that hesitation is because of the rolling resistance. This rolling resistance is among the factors the tyres need to overcome before moving forward.

In other words, extra energy must be transferred to the tyres to maintain a desired constant speed. With the new tyre norms, companies must manufacture tyres with less rolling resistance. This means the vehicle’s efficiency will increase, and the driveability will become a lot better.

Wet Grip

Considering the wet grip as a tyre norm, there are two things to this variable. First, as the name suggests, the ability of the tyre to maintain its grip on the wet surface (road here) is called the wet grip. But if we drive on a wet road, the tyres must displace water to maintain the drip.

Otherwise, the tyres will slide over the water surface because of the aquaplaning, losing traction. Hence, tyres with better-wet grip (the new norms) will be able to displace more water per second, resulting in more grip and fewer chances of losing control.

Rolling sound emission

If you live near a highway, you must have heard the truck tyres’ noise when loaded. Yes, that is called the tyre noise. And this also is a part of the car tyres, but the sound is less prominent. But with the new tyre norms, these noises will be further reduced, making them silent and less irritating to the road.