New tyres for Concorde

Tyres built with a new material developed by Michelin could allow Concorde to
fly again. Michelin has replaced the nylon which reinforces normal tyres with a
new, unnamed material. Designers claim that the tyre stretches less when
inflated and is less likely to lose pressure and throw off debris when damaged.
It is believed that tyre debris caused one of the supersonic airliners to crash
in Paris last year. “This has given us performance that was unknown until now,”
says John Couratier, technical director of Michelin’s development team. “It will
certainly improve the design of tyres and hopefully make for…