Patent ID: 7228732

Claim:
A method of predicting tire wear for a tire without running the tire on the vehicle; the method comprising the steps of: (a) characterizing a wear course by driving a vehicle over the wear course and measuring data related to a plurality of forces experienced by the vehicle; (b) characterizing a first vehicle configuration using a vehicle computer model to define a first vehicle characterization model; (c) using the first vehicle characterization model to calculate first force data that represents the forces that would be experienced by at least one tire of the characterized vehicle if the characterized vehicle were driven over the characterized wear test course in the first vehicle configuration; (d) using the first force data to create a first set of tire wear data; (e) characterizing a second vehicle configuration using the vehicle computer model to define a second vehicle characterization model; (f) using the second vehicle characterization model to calculate second force data that represents the forces that would be experienced by at least one tire of the characterized vehicle if the characterized vehicle were driven over the characterized wear test course in the second vehicle configuration; (g) using the second force data to create a second set of tire wear data; and (h) comparing the first and second sets of tire wear data to predict how the differences between the first and second vehicle configurations affect tire wear.