Car tyres are a perfect source of shoe sole material. It's common to buy rubber crumb from a tyre recycling plant and add up to 40% to the mix of newly moulded rubber soles.

A greener method of recycling is to cut a worn out tyre into strips, which can be cut to shape and glued under a shoe. This gives you more style for less energy & material.

The difficulty is to know which solution to use for the problem of wire inside the tyre tread. I've never had the time to work-out an answer, but have asked a few people for ideas and will put their replies on a message board

1. Using European nylon cross-ply tyres is one solution, but they would either be made for motorbikes, and so too rounded, or made for very rare models of sports car - some of the vintage Jaguar range - and too old as well as being too thinly scattered. Racing car tyres a reliable source, and probably the one used by Ecolution in Romania who supplied the soles below as well as the canvas upper (by using hemp instead of cotton, they find it easy to grow fibre for canvas organically).
2. Using Indian or Far Eastern cross-ply tyres is another solution, but they would be heavy to post and there is usually a 15% tariff .Cutting the cross-ply tyres on site and importing the strips is more likely to work.
3. Using Kevlar re-enforced radial tyres is another solution, depending on how rare they are and whether the Kevlar can be cut The advantage is that once cut, it might be flexible enough to do as a shoe sole. However the Tyre trade association and Wrap, the government tyre recycling quango both suggest that nearly all tyres have steel in them, so it may be hard to find the exceptions. Do hearses have steel in the tyres? Maybe
4. Using Steel re-enforced tyres is a good starting point, as there are mountains of them throughout Europe. I assume that the steel cannot easily be removed, even when warmed, from the rubber, and that if left inside, it would make the sole too stiff to walk on and too hard to cut. The solution would be to cut a sliver of rubber from the outside of a worn tyre leaving the side walls and wire intact. This is very similar to what a tyre re-tread factory does, except that they tend to gauge-off the outer layer as crumb rather than cutting it off as sheet. I don't know if the outer layer is thick enough (say a quarter of an inch) to cut and use and I don't know if anyone is set-up to do it.
5. Hi again!
   > I've been asking around to try to find tyres that aren't steel re-
   > enforced, and been told that racing tyres or perhaps hearses are the
   > only likely ones nowadays
   From what I understand, ATV tyres and many trailer tyres don't contain steel. Supposedly, cut up basketballs also provide good tread. Lastly, I've read that you can cut steel belted tyres with a carbide hacksaw blade, eased by lubricating the cutting with drops of water. Of course, you'd still have the steel wire ends to deal with. In the US, with our mountains of old tires everywhere, the pre-steel kind can still be found. This company seems to know where to look http://ozarkmountainponyswingscom. Maybe they could give you some tyre hunting ideas for the UK And now I'll shut up ;) Good luck on your questCheers!Heidi
6. I asked how someone who sells tyre-sole boots how it's done "There's a scrap yard next to the factory", he said "they just take old tyres, cut off the outer layer or rubber and use that".

If anyone knows the best solution and how to develop it please let me know
John Robertson

Cut-and-pasted ideas from here http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2006/03/how_to_make_sandals_made.html

Posted by: Ullr on March 31, 2006

Re: steel belts etc. The secret to making these is not to use old tires, but cast off recaps. Commercial vehicles (like trucks and busses) often get their tires recapped. [= retread] The process involves grinding down the surface of the tire until it is smooth, and applying a new belt of tread around the tire and bonding it to the tire. Occasionally, these fail, and the tread belt peels off the tire on the road. (This is why it is illegal to run recapped tires on the steering axle). You can see these castoffs on any interstate.

The original "dirty hippy" sandals were almost certainly made from these as people hitchhiked. This belt of tread is much thinner than a tire, has no belts inside it, and can be worked with good snips or shearps, or even with a knife. It also would be much kinder to your feet.

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Posted by: pavo6503 on August 11, 2006

This is not impossible, you just need to use the correct tires. I have found that those spare "donut" tires work beautifully. They have belts, but the belts are NYLON, not steel. Worth doing. [donut is a brand]

Link back to plimsoll.htm page

Link back to the recycled denim sandals page

UK          2    3    4    5    6    7    8    9    10    11    12
EU          34   35.5 36.7 38   39   40.5 42   43   44.2  45.5  47  
US male     3    4    5    6    7    8    9    10   11    12    13
US female   3½   4½   5½   6½   7½   8½   9½   10½  11½   12½   13½