Kraiburg playing an active role in Re-Tyre

In line with its ongoing commitment to take up and act upon its customers’ concerns, Kraiburg Austria has decided to actively participate in the BIPAVER "Re-Tyre" project alongside the various associations, other retreaders and testing institutes as the only material-supplier. “This participation is giving Kraiburg and our customers, the independent retreaders, the opportunity to actively observe and shape the process,” says Thorsten Schmidt, CEO of Kraiburg Austria, who goes on to explain a further motivation for taking part in this project: Access to the ETRTO and ETRMA organisations is reserved exclusively for new tyre manufacturers – and Kraiburg is the only one of Europe's leading material suppliers that doesn’t run its own tyre operations. As an active retreading partner, the Austrian company says it naturally wants the results to influence the development of its own products and materials.

Currently it is expected that, under the new statutory requirements, retreaded tyres will also be required to comply with EU Regulations 661/2009 and 1222/2009. Because of the significantly larger number of production variants offered by retreaders compared to those from new tyre manufacturers, a 100 per cent transfer of the regulations that apply to new tyres would lead to economically infeasible costs for. “The consequence of this would be a drastic reduction in the number of independent retreaders, and retreading would be more focused then ever on plant modernisation,” Schmidt points out. It is therefore considered imperative for Kraiburg, as a materials manufacturer, to contribute to the drafting of regulations that take account of the statutory requirements of Regulations 661/2009 and 1222/2009, ensure costs to the retread industry remain economically viable, ensure the survival of independent retreaders and represent the value of high-quality retreaded tyres transparently and clearly.

Tyre label opportunities

Despite the risks described above, Schmidt sees great opportunities for the independent retreading industry to develop competitive advantages: “Transparency about the rolling resistance, rolling noise and wet grip generated by the tyre label means better competitive positioning, especially for retreaders offering high-quality retreads and corresponding materials,” Schmidt continues. Kraiburg also expects that the tyre label will improve and strengthen the market perception of retreaded tyres as a high-quality product.

As a BIPAVER member, Kraiburg Austria is responsible for four areas within the EU project:

•    Participation in the “Technical Committee” on development of work packages and coordination of the operational implementation of technical work packages (tyre production, testing, etc.)
•    The development, production, procurement and testing of all materials required for the project
•    Production support by Kraiburg’s technical service
•    Support for external testing provided by its technical service

Alongside its “Re-Tyre” participation, Kraiburg is currently initiating internal development projects that aim to specify current Kraiburg products in regards to the requirements of EU regulations 661/2009 and 1222/2009. This should produce development priorities for material, design and process development, thus enabling the fastest possible introduction of policy-compliant products and processes.