Schwalbe Announces Its Future of Tire Recycling
Schwalbe has announced a new recycling program with the aim to hopefully create new tires using old ones.
After spending decades researching, Schwalbe has revealed that it has now had a big breakthrough in tire recycling. Working together with the Technical University of Cologne and recycling specialists Pyrum Innovations, Schwalbe says it now has a "holistic recycling process" to recycle used tires from all brands without waste.
Schwalbe says that until now bike tires were incinerated causing plenty of damage to the environment, but it says the new process will help close the loop. The new technique was created in a garden shed by Pascal Klein who went on to found Pyrum Innovations where it runs the only tire-pyrolysis plant in the world that operates year-round.
Pyrum Innovations has created a two-step process for the recycling with the tires fire being shredded to create rubber granules, textile fiber and steel. Next the rubber granules are taking to a pyrolysis oven where they are heated at 700°C without oxygen. This step creates a gas that is used to power the pyrolysis plant making it fully self-sufficient. The pyrolysis coke is then worked on to create recycled carbon black (rCB) for future tires. The remaining oil can be used to create textile fibers.
 | Recycling not at any price - we are only satisfied with the result when the quality of the recycled materials meets the necessary level with which we can produce Schwalbe quality again. That‘s why we are researching so intensively with the team from TH Köln and Sebastian Bogdahn. Recycled materials are not always of the same quality as their original materials. However, this is a must for the success of the project to produce new bicycle tires from used ones. This is something that is being worked on and researched very hard. The tire on the bicycle is a safety-relevant component. Especially with the significantly higher load demands on bicycle tires today, Schwalbe quality and performance must be the same. |
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I'll show myself out...
My latest Magic Mary Super Gravity Addix Soft all kept their knobs till I wore them down to the ground.
I´ve had the problems you mention on older, golden Magic Mary Super Gravity Trailstars from time to time.
I´m riding solely Magic Mary Super Gravity since 2015. Since 2019 with Nukeproof ARD in the backwheel to reduce my rim consumption to one per year.
Unreparable flats just once or twice in all these years, one being at the EWS in Zermatt with their tire-killer water gullys.
Except for the autumn of 2021 when due to Corona supply shortages I ran Specialized Butcher Grid Trail first, then BlckDmnd and had 5 or 6 flats due to slicing the tires base underneath the knobs on all of them. So I went back to the oh so bad Schwalbe Magic Marys this winter.
The thin SnakeSkin carcass made for very nice light and grippy tires for small or light people, i.e. girlsfriends and little brothers and sisters.
Schwalbe dropped that carcass because too many overweight weightweenie endurobros and OEMs used these tires on their bikes.
Reduce- use your tyres until at least 80% of the knobs are lost
Reuse- replace your rear tire with the used front one - you can always give away to some rookies
Recycle- then buy Schwalbe- probably the names will be updated e.g. Recycled Reggie, Hans dumpf…
Using oil which took thousands to millions of years to develop and out of whom tons of nice things can be made - and then burn it in seconds is stupid anyway.
Rather a blanket statement which can be easily disproven with 5 minutes of research.
"Schwalbe says that until now bike tires were incinerated causing plenty of damage to the environment"
Fun Incentive: Bring 10 old ones and get a new Maxxis for free
Seriously, I do think this is great and I hate simply dumping old tires because nobody wants them for recycling right now. So I'm wondering how they are going to collect them.
I like that place,they let me check the place and explain to me what kind of things they have stored for recycling.
They have tons of batteries and piles of computers/tv´s.
Basically it sounds like a very similar process to the one used for recycling carbon fiber (discussed in this CyclingTips podcast - cyclingtips.com/2022/04/nerd-alert-podcast-recycling-carbon-fiber-is-no-longer-a-pipe-dream).
While rubber can't just be reprocessed to new rubber (at least not with current technology), black carbon is still a key component of the tire-making process. The use of the gas byproduct as the fuel for the pyrolysis process means that this should be close to net zero with a useful outcome.
All these activities release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Probably not cost effective ,I was hoping this was about re treading as it's done with automotive tires . I don't consider heating garbage and burning the off gas as fuel to make energy a form or recycling.
What about re treading ? That actually is very low in CO 2 as a byproduct.
What ratio of carbon is added to the rubber ? Tires are made out of rubber . Carbon black is an additive . It's probably used in trace amounts.
The idea that minimal amounts of Co2 are released is absurd. I think you are looking at just one process pyrolysis.
That is recycling rubber and the carcass is made of rubber . This actually reduces the amount a natural rubber that needs harvesting . Recycling needs to involve one to consume less raw materials. Heating garbage for fuel is not recycling .