BKT Builds its Biggest Tyre for Rigid Dump Trucks

Mumbai headquartered tyre manufacturer, Balakrishna Tyre Industries (BKT) has built its biggest tyre to fit out rigid dump trucks. The prototype for the giant-sized EARTHMAX SR 468 has been made in the 40.00 R 57 size and is ready to be tested in the coming months by BKT engineers.

The machinery to make this enormous tyre reached the Indian plant in Bhuj last January, just a couple of months before the lockdown. Initially, owing to the emergency created by the COVID-19 pandemic, the machinery that reached Bhuj could not be installed. Normal operations could be resumed only after a temporary shutdown of BKT’s manufacturing facilities to implement a rigorous safety plan for all staff.

“Despite the pandemic and the extreme difficulties caused by the situation, in BKT we achieved the impossible; going ahead very determinedly but with a similar focus on people, who for us are the company’s real assets,” said Rajiv Poddar, Joint Managing Director of BKT.

“With this Giant 57” tire, the prototype of which has been made thanks to the extraordinary determination of my fellow workers, we wish to send a positive message to the market, to our partner distributors and our end users. In BKT, research & development into new products, which help the company evolve but also the whole sector has not stopped,” added Poddar.

“At this time, we must call on all our strength, energy and all our creativity. That is what drives BKT’s initiatives and also its products,” opined Dilip Vaidya, President and Director of Technology at BKT.

“It is a very important moment, a giant product has been created, which will now be subject to the most rigorous testing up to the spring of 2021, until we are sure we have achieved the highest possible level of quality and reliability, as always. Only when we are sure we can offer our users the best EARTHMAX SR 468 possible, will we officially launch the new 57” giant,” said Vaidya.

EARTHMAX SR 468 joins the numerous products which make up the EARTHMAX family, a range of radial tyres used on off-road vehicles and equipped with an all-steel structure that provides greater resistance to the casing and hence against damage. A winning feature of the EARTHMAX SR 468 is the special tread design and the compound, created to limit the heat generated. The E-4 depth of the tread provides extreme resistance in highly challenging conditions.