A common question people ask, “is why they can’t put motors in the wheels or wind vanes on the tires or rims, to have them already rotating up to landing speed so they do not skid and leave behind rubber.”
source.image: Fusion Aviation
The idea of putting motors in the wheels or wind vanes on the tires to get them rotating up to landing speed before touchdown has been around sing the 1940’s and there are a vast array of patents on different designs of wind vanes on tires. This video answers that question and explains why it’s not practical. Watch the video from Fusion Aviation.
Airplane tires are very heavy because they have to support the weight of an entire airplane. On top of that, there’s a heavy wheel and the rotating segment of the brake assembly. Getting all that weight spinning to the 150mph or so the airplane is traveling when landing would take a LOT of energy—probably much more than you could get from attaching blades to them.
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The “chirp” and puff of smoke the tires make when landing is a bit of rubber burning off. That unbalances the tire slightly, but since the tires are free to rotate when landing, the light side spins to the top and the heavy side is on the bottom such that each subsequent landing burns off a bit of rubber on the heavy side. It’s sort of a self-correcting system. The theoretical benefits of spinning up the tires in reducing wear would be minimal at best and the costs/disadvantages would more than offset any benefit.via: quora/Charlie Elkins
