Michelin gets R&D insight from IMSA partnership

GREENVILLE, S.C.—Those used tires coming off race cars running in the International Motor Sports Association are black gold to researchers at Michelin North America Inc.

Every turn, every hill, every course puts to the test the company's tires, which are collected after each race and analyzed to provide valuable insight into performance.

The details then are used to not only improve the company's racing tires, but in the development of Michelin's traditional tires sold to the general public, said Tom Sullivan, motorsports marketing manager at the Greenville-based tire maker.

While it's nice to get a name boost by being the official tire supplier to IMSA, Michelin does not look primarily at the partnership as an advertising vehicle.

"We're not a company that needs a tremendous amount of awareness. People know the Michelin brand. It doesn't hurt to connect a little bit more with your consumers through racing directly. That's one of the reasons we race. But really it's a technology development," Sullivan said.

This technology transfer from the racetrack to the roadway is the driving force behind the world's largest tire manufacturer's involvement.

"It is really a laboratory where you can test a tire in the most extreme conditions, get the most amount of data and really get a jump start on the development because you've got that tremendous amount of data," Sullivan said.

This real-world data helps Michelin understand how the tires perform under different temperature and roadway conditions, which can be extreme depending on track design, he said.

As president of IMSA, John Doonan sees the partnership with Michelin as being multi-faceted. Working with IMSA, a division of NASCAR, allows the tire company to test and analyze products under a variety of conditions and on many different makes and models of vehicles. A total of 18 different manufacturers have vehicles racing with IMSA.

"There's a ton of learning that the auto makers and Michelin can take from this laboratory, if you will, and apply it to their everyday consumer products," Doonan said.

IMSA races can take place under extreme conditions and that provides valuable information for Michelin when the rubber literally meets the road.

Wet-weather racing tires, unlike their dry-weather counterparts, do have tread. Racing in wet conditions can help Michelin make decisions about tread patterns that ultimately find their way onto consumer tires, Doonan said. "Decisions about tread patterns have come out of racing, especially in the wet-weather tire. We've learned a ton about (that) from racing."

For Michelin, the business of racing is just that: a business. And one that's expected to be profitable.

IMSA racing tires are not cheap, coming with price tags that can be more than $600 each. Since racing teams can go through multiple sets of tires during a single race, that's a big investment

Michelin has long valued the experience gained in real-world racing conditions, using knowledge learned in competition to help improve the company's products. It's a tradition that goes back to the late 1800s when the rubber company first saw a business opportunity in bicycle tires and racing.

"There is a direct correlation of what we do at the track," Sullivan said. "There's always been a history of motorsports equaling development. And I think that will remain the way," he said.

"There are some folks—and it's every sport—that they get involved in a motor sport or another sport for simply awareness and that kind of thing. And we'll never get involved just for that," Sullivan said. "There's going to be something we learn from it. So I think that's truly important, and I think that's the fabric of our business."

IMSA, with a wide range of vehicle models, race-track configurations and race lengths, provides a variety of ways Michelin can research and develop their products.

Some IMSA races last 100 minutes. Others last an entire day—and night.

"That gives us a tremendous amount of data that, as you can imagine, we can take back to our research and development to understand and learn under the toughest conditions. We can figure out what's happened to the tires and how we can relate it to the production car tires," Sullivan said.

"We call it our accelerated development laboratory, which we can learn more about a tire in a 24-hour race than we can probably in months and months in working with modeling or simulation," he said.

Doonan also highlighted how racing tires used in extreme conditions can help inform Michelin about rubber compounds that ultimately can be used on tires serving the general public.

"Michelin can develop a variety of different load compounds on the sidewall of the tire as well as the overall tire itself. (That's useful) when it comes to then producing the tire that provides a good ride quality for the consumer that also provides good performance," he said.

Information, Doonan said, from "the racetrack in the most extreme environment can be immediately applied."

"We've provided the laboratory, we've provided the racetracks, we've provided the extreme conditions for them to do their work," he said.