People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 September 1895 — A New Bicycle Tire. [ARTICLE]

A New Bicycle Tire.

A new tire has been invented, called the ball-bearing bicycle tire. The objection to the ordinary tube tires is that a puncture in one place destroys the usefullness of the whole tire until the puncture is repaired. The new tire consists of a closed rubber tube, filled with hollow elastic balls of the same diameter as the internal diameter of the tube. These balls ar-s vulcanized and inserted in the tube during the process of manufacture. The tube may first be vulcanized, however, and the balls inserted through an opening which is afterward closed. It is said that additional elasticity and rigidity is imparted to the tire by the insertion of these hermetically sealed elastic balls, and, as each ball is an independent cushion, it would require puncture of several balls to make the tire useless. Another curious pneumatic ball tire has been pa tented in England, substituting for the continuous tubular tire a series of rubber balls, set in cups at the outer end of the spokes; Jie balls are so arranged that they may be simultaneously inflated. Several advantages ace claimed for this device, one of them being that no serious inconvenience will follow the puncturing of one or two of the balls. It is also claimed that there is a great savingof ground cohesion. and this will increase the ease and speed of propulsion. —Scientific American.