Before you launch into a “That’s CGI!” campaign, can it. You are wrong and we’ll prove it in the videos below. We thought for sure when we saw a film made by BFGoodrich that featured several of their off road tires being pushed out of the back of an airplane at 10,000ft to see what would happen when they reached the ground that it was a computer generated situation. We have both the finished product and a “making of” video below and the “making of” video shows the sky diver jumping out behind the tire to get the amazing and dizzying shot of the tire leaving the back of what seems to be a plane normally used for skydiving.
The point of this exercise was to create a scene where the tire shows how tough it is by crashing into the Earth at terminal velocity and not failing in any way. Amazingly, the idea worked and the tires were able to be bolted onto a Jeep after crash landing and bouncing across the desert. Perhaps the most awesome part of the video is watching the bouncing. When these things land they take massive bounces back into the air multiple times and it is pretty impressive to see that the side walls do not fail, they to do not blow off the bead, and when the crew gets to them they are pretty much unscathed.
The visual of the tire free falling is amazing and weird and the way it moves around in the air is a study in the bizarre aerodynamic properties of the wheel, the tread, and the overall shape. It flips and rolls, and floats, and just really does look like the movements and the environment were created on a computer, but they weren’t. Yes, this is a wacky promotional idea, but it certainly has worked because places like us and virtually every other outlet on the interwebs has picked up on it and BFG wins big time with this freebie promotion of their new off road tire. In the same vein, we don’t feel bad running the video because it is a great watch!
PRESS PLAY BELOW TO SEE THE FINISHED AD/FILM FIRST AND THEN THE MAKING OF MOVIE BELOW IT – BOTH ARE DEFINITELY WORTH THE CLICK!
I expected the aerodynamic properties of the wheel to be like zero….
NO WAY that wheel survived that bounce on the rim IF we are seeing the actual event. BF BULL SHIT!
I have to say I was surprised that the wheels were able to take the landing, but it did seem that the tires took the brunt of the impact.
I would have loved to be in the meeting when someone raises their hand and said “I have an idea for a new commercial…”
I have no doubt in the world that a K02 would survive a free fall, but that magnesium rim would doubtlessly fracture somewhere and make the unit undrivable.
Magnesium rim? It is the wheel from a Jeep Rubicon.
Like I said Brian, BF BS! ( note not BS BF)
It didn’t look like a steelie.
I may be wrong, I dunno.
I
Maybe if you watched the video you wouldn’t be such a dumbass.
It says they dropped a set, and it shows four in the plane. They only put one on the Jeep. So all they needed was one to survive to make the commercial.
If you watch the making of video you will the the other dropped as well.
It looked like they dropped all four and made the video from a composite of all the drops. The wheel tire combo didn’t look very aerodynamically clean, so its terminal velocity probably wasn’t all that high. I would bet that most tires would survive that.
The terminal velocity is probably around 40-50mph (complete guess), so like hitting a curb at that speed. Not all tires would survive that either.
It said two days out in the Utah desert, me thinks most landed on the rim and successfully destroyed said rim. They needed to capture at least one good tire landing, and they did.
So when does this get repeated on Mythbusters????
Why only 40 to 50? A tire has twice as much air resistance as a human?
Exactly? Human’s terminal velocity is 100-120mph, so I’d think a tire should be around half that or less due to poor aerodynamics and a fraction of the weight/mass.
I love BFG tires and as a guy who had another-brand SUV tire split to pieces just sitting in the driveway this year I’m not surprised with these. I’d be curious what actual terminal velocity was.
As far as how many tires were dropped…to get one to land on it’s tread it probably took a few tries.
Still…weird how in the first video, the tire just happens to go out of screen when it hits after being followed all that way, and something odd does happen with the picture. I’d say if it was supposed to look “for real”, do it over.
We are a suspicious lot, aren’t we? Conspiracy theories abound. I’ll bet that tire hit at much higher than 40-50 mph, but either way, it took a pretty good lick. I am surprised the bead did not leak the air out at impact, but there you go. Tires take a lot of abuse, just peruse the personal injury cases involving tires to see how people abuse the hell out of them and only then do the tires fail.
You wanna see a pic of my Dunlop that exploded, just sitting on it’s side off the car? It’s twin brother also came apart but at-least that was on the road (No abuse, well under-load, and that’s why I removed them all). Whatever abuse the mfr. took from lawyers over those (yes they were from the FordExploder era), they deserved.
I don’t believe for one second that the tires they put on the Jeep were the same ones they dropped any more than I believe any of the political campaign commercials I’ve seen this year.
Most mopar “mag” wheels are forged,not 2 piece
Is this the reason Radial T/A’s prices doubled overnight?
Whatever, when all the tire mfgr’s can make tires that survive in REAL WORLD conditions (can you say POTHOLE?), I will be impressed.
A great publicity stunt, but this vid proves NOTHING about how the tires hold up in the REAL WORLD!
Well, if these KO2s are built like their KM2s, then I’d bet they could handle quite a lot.
BFG and Mickey Thompsons are pretty much the gold standard offroad.
Hell I just wish they were cheaper. 35″ tires aren’t cheap.
The Terminal Velocity of a Sky Diver in the “belly down” position (not being aerodynamic) is 122 MPH.
The TV of one of those tires is at least 100 MPH.
in the first video if you look closely, the wheel lands in open area but when the guy goes to pick it up it’s laying beside a rock
In the making of video it looks like the second tire shown the inside bead was bent . so some damage was done.