Russians Make a 240-Lb Set of Mud and Snow Tires Out of 12,000 Nails, Get a Flat Tire

There are exceptions to this universal law of circular motion – sometimes, rubber is simply not the best material for the job. I mean, even rubber tires are fitted with steel studs in certain conditions to provide extra grip and keep the wheels firmly in contact with the road surface. This approach led certain mechanically inclined philosophers from the Far and Wild(-Ideas) East to ask themselves: can rubber tires be replaced entirely by nails?

Depending on how we look at things, the answer can be either a resounding ‘Yes!’ or a strong ‘Hell, no!’ yes, the rubber tires can be substituted by long, sturdy carpenter’s nails made of steel. But will they work (in part or at all)? That’s a different matter altogether, and who better to provide an accurate, field-tested answer than the merry boys from Garage 54?

Headquartered in Novosibirsk, in the heart of Southern Siberia (about four times closer to Mongolia and China than it is to the Russian Capital City of Moscow), the relentless seekers of automotive Nirvana put the idea to the test.

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Using roughly 12,000 nails (60d, or six inches/15 cm long), the Russians fabricated four 16-inch ‘tires’ for their Mercedes G-Wagen to go off-roading. By now, every reader who has ever held or seen a nail like that will wonder how much the makeshift wheels weigh.

Well, the combined heft of the nails alone is 110 kg (243 lbs), which is 27.5 kg per wheel (61 lbs). This is quite a bit over the regular rubber tire mass, but the boxy Mercedes SUV is not exactly known for its anorexic demeanor and isn’t afraid to carry the overload around.

First of all, hats off to the welders; they did an outstanding job installing the nails onto the sheet of metal wrapped around the wheels and welded to the rims. How long that particular task took is not disclosed, but the boys were quite busy. When the work was over, the big old Merc drove off into the snow and mud (Siberian spring thaw brings pleasures of life like quagmires and excessively treacherous ruts and whatnot) to put the new setup to field trials.

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The tough-as-nails tires work fine at first (especially on fresh snow) and even come with the uncalculated secondary effect of collecting debris from the road. However, nails weren’t designed to support loads on their own but rather to join together different parts (including load-bearing structures).

As such, when the nails hit the road (pun intended), it's pretty much game over. The steel wire bends and twists under the car's weight (2.5 tons without a driver), proving that acupuncturing the road isn’t a healthy tire treatment. Despite being the only wheels in the world that don’t get punctured, but instead puncture the ground, the nail tires can and will get flat.

Phase one of the experiment had the Garage 54 guys biting their nails in anticipation. Still, they obviously didn’t nail it on the head this time. I guess they should go back to the drawing board on the nail and fight tooth and nail to find a working solution, even if it means sleeping on a bed of nails to find one. After all, all is not lost just for the want of a nail, and this shouldn’t be the final nail in this experiment’s coffin.

Who knows, maybe the Russians will get stubborn enough to eat nails, spit rivets, and nail their colors to the mast. This may seem as unlikely as nailing jelly to a tree. Still, we’ve seen many past endeavors from the Siberian piston elven to know this isn’t hanging by a nail. Who’s willing to bet this story isn’t as dead as a doornail and that the Russians will have it nailed to the wall eventually?