Goodyear Develops Airless Tires For New Moon Rover

Goodyear is going back to the moon. The company will supply airless tires to the Project Artemis lunar rover, which will be manufactured by Lockheed Martin and General Motors.

Goodyear is already working on airless tires, including testing the concept at a lunar soil test site. The final design should be able to work for years on the moon’s hard, crater-ridden surface. In addition, temperatures there can vary from below -250 degrees Fahrenheit at night to over 250 degrees Fahrenheit during the day.

“Everything we’ve learned from manufacturing tires for the extremely difficult lunar operating environment will help us build better airless tires on Earth,” said Chris Helsel, senior vice president of global operations and chief technology officer at Goodyear.

Goodyear previously donated spare parts for the Apollo 11 mission in 1969. It supplied components such as window frames for the command module, panels that hold instruments, and a float bag for the capsule to support the capsule’s fall into the sea.

The Lunar Rovers were part of the journey on the moon during the Apollo 15, Apollo 16, and Apollo 17 missions. They only traveled a few miles away from the landing site but gave astronauts a faster way to get around.

In comparison, the new rover from Lockheed Martin and General Motors should have traveled further over the course of several years of service. Lockheed intends to commercialize this vehicle by selling access to commercial companies and other space agencies looking to travel on the moon.

So far, we’ve only seen GM’s design for the Lunar Terrain Vehicle in rendering. They show a vehicle with a simple design with a flat bottom and a roll hoop with lights on top. There is room for two people plus a large cargo bed at the back.

In addition to human control, the rover will be able to operate autonomously to pick up astronauts or go where people would need a vehicle.

Project Artemis aims to return humans to the moon. It’s still a few years away as the plan is to start with unmanned tests and gradually work up to putting people on the lunar surface. SpaceX is developing a lander for this endeavor.