Manually inflating your tires at the gas station may soon be a thing of the past. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company has just announced it's moving on to the next phase of testing for a new piece of technology that can automatically inflate tires, helping in the overall push toward improving fuel economy.

Over the next 18 months, multiple U.S.- and Canada-based trucking fleets will be testing the company's Air Maintenance Technology, which continuously monitors tire pressure to keep it at the correct inflation level. The system utilizes an automatic pumping device that's housed inside the tire, and the truck fleets will be testing it in their normal daily operations. Goodyear says that tire-related costs are the single largest maintenance item for commercial vehicle fleet operators, which helps explain why the company wanted to tap into the segment. The AMT system for commercial tires is being designed to perform under a variety of operating conditions and through multiple retreads.


“This phase of testing will go a long way in helping us determine when we can make this technology available in the commercial tire marketplace,” said Joseph Zekoski, Goodyear’s chief technical officer in a release.

The DOE’s Office of Vehicle Technology has provided a $1.5 million grant to assist in the research and development of the AMT system for commercial vehicle tires.

Properly inflated tires not only save fuel and reduce carbon dioxide emissions, but also help increase tire life, which is why the new tech looks promising. If the technology comes to passenger cars, it will join low-rolling-resistance tires in the fight for better mpg. While low-rolling-resistance tires already help in this regard, a 2013 J.D. Power survey revealed that satisfaction with those types of tires is declining. Low-rolling-resistance tires appear on everything from efficient hybrids to sportier cars like the Scion FR-S, but J.D. Power said in the study that many consumers weren't aware of the trade-off between overall performance and fuel economy. Self-inflating tires could offer improved fuel mileage without sacrificing as much in terms of performance.

Source: Goodyear