Designed to ‘solve a conflict’ – Mitas’ Continental CHO tyre

At this week’s Agritechnica show in Germany, Mitas launched its latest cyclic harvest operation (CHO) tyres, which were developed together in “intensive cooperation” with farm machinery manufacturer Claas. The Continental CHO SVT is currently available in size 800/70 R32 CHO 175A8 and was, in the words of Hans-Ulrich Klose, head of Mitas’ Automotive Engineering unit, developed to “solve the conflict between compliance in road application and the increasing need for soil protection.” This is, Klose adds, a measure made necessary by the latest generation of high performance combine harvesters that are equipped with larger headers and bigger grain tanks.

“The challenge is the dramatically increasing tyre load in field application with full grain tanks and a mounted cutter bar,” Klose elaborated. “We couldn’t follow the traditional way of using even wider tyres, as this would conflict with allowed vehicle width regulations.” As a solution, the new size 800/70 R 32 Continental CHO tyre offers considerably more load capacity at up to 31 per cent less inflation pressure than a standard tyre; Mitas says that when the CHO tyre is fitted, a combine can carry an increased front axle load of up to 21.5 tonnes with only 1.6bar tyre pressure during harvesting operations. The lower inflation pressure gives the tyre a footprint that is up to 24 per cent larger than standard, reducing soil compaction while reducing slippage and fuel consumption. This enlarged footprint also provides better mobility under difficult and wet soil conditions.

Theoretically, footprint can be increased simply by producing a broader tyre. Yet a tyre maker cannot ignore width considerations without falling foul of legal requirements. Therefore, Class and Mitas developed the concept for the new tyre based upon Continental super volume tyre technology. Its narrow construction allowed the development team to create a tyre that would ensure total vehicle width remained less than 3.50 metres. “This saves money because the farmer does not have to pay for escort vehicles,” commented Jens Steinhardt, key account manager at Mitas.

Mitas will start selling the CHO tyres through its subsidiaries in November, and Claas will list the tyre as an available option on the next update of its pricelist.