Continental's ContiSportContact 5 has come out on top in the demanding tyre test carried out by leading car magazine Auto Express. The Auto Express test celebrates the best of the best in the tyre market, highlighting exceptional performance, quality, safety, desirability and value. It is seen within the motoring industry as a stamp of approval offering motoring enthusiasts confidence when looking for their next tyre purchase.
Just a day after we announced the first early details of the NTDA’s national tyre labelling survey, it has now emerged that mytyres.co.uk is also managing a survey on a very similar subject.
Writing in a customer email dated 2 September 2013, mytyres.co.uk explained the background to tyre labelling before going on to explain that company is interested in learning more about what consumers themselves think of labelling.
Thousands of motorists are driving potentially dangerous cars as the number of vehicles on the road that have previously been written off increases. The National Association of Bodyshops (NAB) has previously called on the Competition Commission to review their position on write-offs during an investigation into the private motor insurance market.
However the Competition Commission say that they have no plans to review this further stating that despite the evidence they received during the investigation, they judged that write-offs were an issue relating to the supply of used cars and not related to the provision of Private Motor Insurance and related goods and services.
Bob Jane, founder of the Australian fast fit network that still bears his name, lost twice over in the state of Victoria’s Supreme Court on 9 August. Not only did Justice Michael Sifris dismiss his claim for AU$2.9 million he says is owed to him, the ruling further embittered the 83 year old’s feelings towards the defendant – his son, Rodney.
Very high load capacity, an avoidance of downtime during harvesting and minimal soil compaction – these three qualities are priorities when agricultural operators purchase new tyres, and Firestone says its latest product for this market segment was launched to meet these criteria. Bridgestone Europe reports that this tyre, the new Firestone Maxi Traction Combine, is now available in several sizes for replacement market and original equipment fitment.
Motorists carry their most precious cargo when making the school run, but that’s no guarantee that the vehicles they use will be fit for duty. Time spent by Falken at Moorfield Primary School in Shropshire uncovered a high number of illegal tyres – eight out of the 25 parents’ cars checked were fitted with tyres that didn’t make the grade. The school car park check also identified one tyre with a nail in it and a further two had tyres over ten years old. In the interests of safety, Falken provided vouchers for free tyres and fitting to the first five owners with illegally worn or damaged tyres.
Continental garnered a number of winter tyre accolades in the first half of 2013, most recently receiving a coveted award from the UK’s Auto Express magazine. Continental’s ContiWinterContact TS850 ‘Best Winter Tyre’ for the second consecutive year in the 2013 Product Awards.
Solideal UK reports that Camoplast Solideal is restructuring its global business to place a greater emphasis on the materials handling and construction markets. Therefore, as of 1 August a specialist account manager selling to only one market sector will replace current customer contacts. This means that customers who purchase both solid and construction tyres, for example, will now deal with two specialist account managers instead of just one, as may previously been the case.
Leading Indian retreading equipment supplier Elgi is targeting new tyre manufacturers with the launch of a monorail tyre handling system, developed by its Brazilian subsidiary Armonas. India is home to 39 tyre manufacturers and 60 individual production plants and Elgi hopes to take advantage of producers moving into, or developing their retreading capacity.
Bridgestone has donated £2,000 to a voluntary first aid service in Warwick in order to buy a defibrillator, new uniform and premium tyres for its four ambulances. The Leamington based brand says the Warwick Ambulance Association support demonstrates its commitment to vital community causes.
A top priority for any fleet manager is safety. Recognising this, Days Contract Hire has teamed up with Michelin to give away Michelin safety kits worth £50 each to its fleet drivers, their friends and family members when they purchase two or more Michelin car, van or 4×4 tyres this year.
When US publication Popular Science Monthly enthused in March 1935 over “modern scientific methods” that enable a tyre casing to be “rebuilt” instead of discarded after a working life of 20,000 miles or so, the retreading industry was still a relative newcomer on the scene. It was less than 20 years since Oliver Rubber introduced pre-cure retreading, and when the Popular Science Monthly article hit the newsstands, one aspect of retreading remained very labour intensive – buffing a tyre was still partially carried out by hand, with steel brushes used to prepare the casing for retreading. This was soon to change; in the second half of the 1930s, a German named Nanno Collmann looked into ways of simplifying this part of the retreading process, and in 1938 his company introduced the world’s first specialised tyre buffing machine. Three quarters of a century later, the Collmann brand is still a name respected by retreaders the world over and the company, under new ownership, retains a strong interest in the sector.
Cumbria County Council has declared the purchase of part-worn tyres “safe” on its patch following visits to part-worn tyre traders in the region by officers from Cumbria Trading Standards and the Police. The council says officers carried out 22 visits to premises in Cumbria between February and May in response to a TyreSafe survey that showed 98 per cent of examined tyres did not meet current legal requirements.
Dealers are reporting a rise in the number of consumers asking them for CO2 information as part of the used car buying process, according to the latest survey from vehicle information expert, HPI. However, HPI's new research confirms that cost is the driver behind consumer interest in CO2 data and savvy dealers, who are meeting the needs of their customers by providing this information, are securing more deals.
As well as a number of other aftermarket-orientated seminars Tyres & Accessories has already reported on, Autopromotec’s AutopromotecEDU plenary track also featured what was purportedly Italy’s first conference on remanufacturing. Entitled, “Excellence in material recycling and the industrial remanufacturing cycle”, the conference was introduced and moderated by Il Sole 24 Ore’s journalist Maurizio Caprino. He provided an overview on the current state and future perspectives of the remanufacturing industry, with several interesting presentations.
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