CHECK YOUR TIRE PRESSURE!

I could have used this advice to check pressure yesterday. Wife called me at 7am this morning saying that her tire light lit up on her dash on her way to work. I was half asleep and told her I'd check it when she got home. But she works an hour away and drives 80mph for most of the commute so I got worried and drove to her office to check the tires. All four were at 32 psi. Door sticker says 35 psi. Topped all four tires off and the tire light light went out. At least it wasn't a flat tire.
 
A few weeks ago I stopped to put air in my tires. The young woman in front of me had just put air in her car tires. The pressure was set at 48 pounds!
 
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Yeah, It takes longer to pass through the rubber than Oxygen. It's also had the water removed, so helps prevent corrosion on the inner part of the wheel.
Nitrogen reacts to temp the same as plain old air. Plain old air is 80% Nitrogen anyway.
Surprisingly if one owns a car long enough or has an old car, it’s possible to have a bead leak due to corrosion. I did. But I looked over the shoulder of the tire shop tech and both of us were surprised how little there was, not as you would see online. Yet a tiny bit caused a leak.

And not one of my finer moments. I tried to use duct tape inserted between tire and rim to stop the leak, thinking duct tape can fix anything. Doesn’t work here, folks! 😂
 
Did you take a picture of duct tape around the bead of that tire?

ME: 36 psi + 10% for highway travel = 39.6 psi aka 40 psi.
After a week one tire was 35 psi. The others were at 40.

CHECK YOUR TIRE PRESSURE, YES
 
Did you take a picture of duct tape around the bead of that tire?

ME: 36 psi + 10% for highway travel = 39.6 psi aka 40 psi.
After a week one tire was 35 psi. The others were at 40.

CHECK YOUR TIRE PRESSURE, YES
No, but I deflated the tire, and wedged the tape in between the rim and bead. And now the slow leak gushed where the tape was…🤣
 
Once upon a time in the early 80's, I dated a woman who had a Datsun 280 Z. She mentioned that the car was hard to steer when she pulled into her one car garage, what could be wrong? Looked at the tires and they were low on air, just looking at them. Pulled out the pressure gauge, 12 psi. Refilled the tires and wow! what a difference! No more hard steering problems from then on...
RV
 
Speaking of which Costco machines seem to be well calibrated. I filled all 4 up to 40 Sat when hot. The next morning I read all 4–2 were 36.3, one was 36.1, and one was 36.5.
 
Thanks to all of you wonderful folks, I purchased 2 Jaco tire pressure gauges. One analog and one digital, one for my car and one for home. I am OCD and check my tires frequently, a couple of times a week in the winter especially.
 
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Tis the season, temperature dropping.

Depending upon how your TPMS is set, you might loose 10+ psi before it alerts you! Thats a lot of air in a low profile tire like many cars have these days.

And of course cars without TPMS need to be watched because you just dont know.

With it getng colder, we can see some pretty big fluctuation. Some cold morning, before too long, go out and check the pressure!
I check ours at least every 2 weeks.
All 4 vehicles.
It's very important to keep your tires wearing and handling properly, imo.
 
like the experts would say, you lose 1 to 2% tire pressure per month, and you gain or lose about 1 psi for every 10F change in temp, so it makes sense to check the tires once a month or so.. or more frequently if you are anal retentive. :)
 
No, but I deflated the tire, and wedged the tape in between the rim and bead. And now the slow leak gushed where the tape was…🤣
You could try a couple dabs of tire Slime at the spot. Don't fill the tire though, as a lot of tire places won't mess around with a Slimed tire.

One of the tires on the Outback was flat from a puncture the Sunday morning my wife was leaving for camping. No problem, I'll throw the winter set on, except one had corrosion around the valve stem and would drop air pressure rapidly. The winters are visually a bit bigger so I settled for 3 of them and 1 all season on the rear would be the least likely to cause a problem. I was curious though if I could fix the valve stem leak without replacing it, so I put a few drops of slime around the stem and with no pressure in the tire, just spun the valve stem around a few times to smooth out the corrosion and let the slime penetrate a bit. Left it alone for a 1/2 hour and then filled the tire and no leak. Stayed that way for a week before I got the whole tire resealed.
When the tech saw the slime around the stem I told him what I did and he was fine with that, just not a whole tire filled with it.
 
You could try a couple dabs of tire Slime at the spot. Don't fill the tire though, as a lot of tire places won't mess around with a Slimed tire.
yeah, Slime is good stuff... but it makes a tire unpatchable... that said, I have some 18 year old tractor tires which are seriously weather checked with sidewall cracking, and they lose enough air that you have to put air in them every time you use the tractor,,, but pumping about a pint of slime in each tire cured that problem.
 
When I went to SCCA Driver School I learned a process to discover correct tire pressure. Went something like inflate to recommended pressure, take a few laps, and then measure pressure and use a formula to determine pressure needed.
 
Added air to 4 vehicles this morning. Temperatures were down over 30 degrees from last week. Next week goes up a bit then back down.

Added 3-4psi per tire per vehicle.

Random comment/discussion right after with neighbors when they asked why I was doing all the cars. Quick explain on the 1psi per 10 degree thing.

Neighbor- "you know what car has the worst tires? Nissan! I won't buy another Nissan because I got so many nails and flats with mine. Tires are too thin on them" :unsure: :ROFLMAO:.

It wasn't even worth the energy to go further.
 
Added air to 4 vehicles this morning. Temperatures were down over 30 degrees from last week. Next week goes up a bit then back down.

Added 3-4psi per tire per vehicle.

Random comment/discussion right after with neighbors when they asked why I was doing all the cars. Quick explain on the 1psi per 10 degree thing.

Neighbor- "you know what car has the worst tires? Nissan! I won't buy another Nissan because I got so many nails and flats with mine. Tires are too thin on them" :unsure: :ROFLMAO:.

It wasn't even worth the energy to go further.
Agree, cold here in Michigan. I check my tires every morning, because I am OCD. I keep them 1 psi above recommended...I like a cushion.
 
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