How would we approach modelling a tractor tire pretty much like you can see here below. I’ve been trying to accomplish it with one quarter of a torus manually extruding the tire profile and then mirror it, but thats clearly not the way to approach this.
any input is appreciated!
You can model a portion of the shape of the raised part of the tread and the lower part of the tread, and extrude down in a curved shape for the sidewall of the tire. Use a circle, array, and mirror modifier to get the round shape of the tire and subdivision surface to get smoother edges and possibly toss in an edge split.
This might also help give a couple ideas into the process, no laughing at the ancient Blender or young BlenderGuru lol but that is essentially how I model car tires still to this day. Careful though on size of the tire and details when you add in the array as it will shoot vert counts through the roof. Nothing like having a car with 300k verts and a tire with 500k verts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhmRn-tYtxE
i tried and fail using the array !
problem is that the threads are not symmetrical so how do you deal with that ?
I did many other tires with array but the patterns were symmetrical and easy to use array!
any example or video showing how to do wold be nice ?
got some tractors not far I can take pictures to show pattern!
thanks
happy cl
I will see what I can do as far as a video goes, won’t have sound though due to my mic is on the fritz. And I am sure there is better more current methods than the one that I use but it works for me as far as just modeling and not animation.
here is one pic of tires for a small farm tractor
not symmetrical function of Z axis
if you need closer shot let me know I will take one
happy cl
This might be helpful if you have not yet found it…
Better look at this one… 
A bit easier to follow… But only one of many possible aproaches…
It’s some years old, but still valid…
not certain you can you do
not symmetrical threads with these ?
did you see any method for not symmetrical threads ?
thanks
happy cl
got the beginning of something here
did a full tire with subsurf
then added modifiers
got modifiers array sub curve and shrinkwrap
let me know what you think
still need to apply all these modif and extrude the pattern
only problem is that it is overlapping along axis of array
which is not like the real pattern!
happy cl
might be possible with addon circular array
happy bl
Not sure if this is the type of look you are going for @RayVelcoro but I am posting a quick 128 sample render of what I came up with and I will also attach a .blend if it is what you are looking for as well for reference. The last layer has the tire with the modifiers used in the setup. The first render layer has the scene that is rendered in the picture below.
Tractor Tire.blend (8 MB)
that is the use of array for simpler threads symmetrical
which is very nice and works fine
but look carefully at the tractor’s threads
and they are overlapping which I don’t know how to do with the array modifier
there must be another method to get it done
but still looking for it
also thread are rounded not rectangular
so would end up with high res model!
thanks for feedback
happy cl
Thanks for the input so far guys! Also thanks for the .blend FlyingBanana, It’s something I think I work with. Gonna remodel it when I got the time for this project!
@RickyBlender They do overlap in mine, I just didn’t make them curved enough. If you look at the last layer of my blend you will see that the one section with two treads is fully modeled and do overlap past the middle point can be edited even more if needed, this was just a quick sample to show what I was talking about. That plane can be made into whatever you want the tread pattern to look like which is why I said it can take a toll on the vert counts if you get too crazy with it.
Hey; Array - throw a ‘simple deform’ modifier set to bend/360 on it and you got a tire ( Agricultural Bar type tread pattern) :yes:
that is beginning to look like symmetrical along main axis !
so can use the array modifier
nice pattern which is close to the photo I’v shown
should also work with a curve pattern I guess
thanks
happy cl
