London – Bridgestone Corp. has announced plans to invest Yuan54.73 million (€7 million) to upgrade its passenger car tire manufacturing facility in Tianjin City, China.

In a 5 Dec environmental impact report submitted to the local authorities, Bridgestone said the investment would introduce new machinery to improve tire quality.

Set to start in December, the project involves replacing “three-compound-extruder” with advanced “four-compound-extruder” technology” by mid-2025.

The new technology is said to enable simulous processing of four different rubber materials at deliver ‘significantly improved’ the end-product quality.

In addition, Bridgestone aims to introduce new machinery for ‘rapid cooling to remove glue coating during tire production while maintaining surface adhesion.’

This process, according to the tire maker, will both improve the performance of the tire and reduce “stretching” on the production line.

Furthermore, the new equipment will employ digital multi-stage speed control technology for tread placement: reducing deviations caused by manual operations.

According to Bridgestone, the project will not change production capacity at the site, which currently stands at 25,000 units per day.