We consider ourselves to be the world experts in the failure of floating large objects in bodies of water. We have shown you almost every documented case of monster trucks and other vehicles heading for Davy Jones’ locker when attempting to be buoyant. Not today, though! This is one of the coolest publicity stunts we have ever seen and it was pulled off by MITAS which is one of the largest European agricultural tire manufacturers that there is.
They also sell here in North America. In an effort to demonstrate the exceptionally low ground pressure exerted by their larger tires, they stuck them on a legit farm tractor and then drove the whole works right into the drink! Nope, it did not go “tires up” as we often see. Instead, this thing was floating along like a little green version of the Love Boat. No Issac making drinks, though.
The tractor seemed to have perfect front to real balance and whoever actually ran the numbers and conducted the early testing for this experiment gets all the credit. This is a job well done and a really, really cool thing to see. This video was made somewhere in Europe, perhaps in Poland, Spain, or whichever of the myriad of countries the company deals in.
We talk about tires around here mostly as high performance objects and believe it or not, these guys do as well. The different is just the performance metrics being measured. It is not about lateral grip or sidewall deflection, it is about toughness, durability, longevity, and operating in potentially bad conditions. This is awesome!
What was the “floaty” doing on the front? It wasn’t there on land, appears on water then disappears back on dry land. Calling BS on this.