Tire inflation compressors

[sciphi]

You can probably afford a new set of rims with the gas you save keeping your tires properly inflated.

I have a $20 Wal-Mart compressor that's branded 'Campbell-Hausfield', is solidly built, has a pressure gauge to let me know the neighborhood, and has worked well on occasional use for the past couple years.

 

[rationull]

It just occurred to me, wouldn't the "moisture from compression" issue apply to bike tire pumps too given that they don't have a tank? Even for bike tires?

 

[Louie's gone fishing]

If you don't thing that tire pressure is worth the trouble of buying a fifty buck compressor and checking at home, cold, once a month please consider, if not for the mileage and wear savings, then consider that I'm out there driving two and I don't want to find you at the side of the road with a blown tire. Low tire pressure is dangerous and slips up on you if you are not careful. And if you trust your safety to a tire store employee you should reconsider. Every time I have purchased new tires and asked for specific setting I’ve always found they have missed the mark and by different amounts. I has not been a case of calibration as in all tires off by the same amount but carelessness on the part of the installer.

 

[moribundman]

I two thing so!

 

[rationull]

Oh, I'm pretty obsessive. I've never observed my tires more than 5-7 PSI low, ever. Even back when I had to go to the gas station to fill them up.

 

[Louie's gone fishing]

5 to 7 off is not acceptable for me.

 

[oldmaninsc]

Originally Posted By: Louie's gone fishing
If you don't thing that tire pressure is worth the trouble of buying a fifty buck compressor and checking at home, cold, once a month please consider, if not for the mileage and wear savings, then consider that I'm out there driving two and I don't want to find you at the side of the road with a blown tire. Low tire pressure is dangerous and slips up on you if you are not careful. And if you trust your safety to a tire store employee you should reconsider. Every time I have purchased new tires and asked for specific setting I’ve always found they have missed the mark and by different amounts. I has not been a case of calibration as in all tires off by the same amount but carelessness on the part of the installer.


I agree. I had a slow leak on one of my vehicles. I took it to the tire chain where I purchased the tires. They repaired the tire, rotated and balanced all 4 and told me they set the pressure of all 4 to 35. Funny thing - next morning I happened to get out my trusty digital gauge, and found that 3 were at 35, but the repaired one was at 38.5 lbs. Hmmm!
I also had this happen numerous times over the years with new tires from many different places.
I also agree, 5-7 lbs is NOT acceptable to me either. I consider that to be rather underinflated!

 

[rationull]

Originally Posted By: oldmaninsc

I also agree, 5-7 lbs is NOT acceptable to me either. I consider that to be rather underinflated!


Really depends on what the 5-7 psi is down from. 7 PSI down from 30-32 is significant, yes. 5 PSI down from 50 or 60 on a pickup (or even down from the 45 or so that some passenger cars recommend) is a much smaller difference. I usually run 35 on my civic, so 5 PSI down is only 2 PSI down from the recommended 32. While different people have different thresholds for what's "acceptable" I don't consider 30 PSI down from 35 on a car that recommends 32 to be dangerously low. Especially not in normal driving patterns.

The scary fact is that a lot of people never check their pressure. I'd bet there are a huge number of cars out there running normal circuits 10 PSI under the manufacturer recommendation. And unless a car is top-heavy (SUV) or being driven hard I doubt it's any more unsafe than all the tailgating and other that goes on anyway. Not that that kind of neglect is OK by any measure, but it happens.

At any rate I wasn't sure if Louie was directing his post regarding safety at me (not sure given that I never said I didn't think maintaining pressure was worth the trouble or worth a compressor purchase) or if his post responding to the 5-7 PSI figure was a continuation of that, but those are my thoughts on it.

 

[oilnoob425]

Originally Posted By: AcuraTech
Originally Posted By: ThirdeYe
10 minutes per tire


Are you kidding me? I need to waste 40 minutes filling tires like I need a hole in my head. Seriously, what a waste. Stop by the local Firestone dealer and have one of the general service punks fill up your tires, it'll take em' 2 minutes. Throw em' a $5 dollar tip for the 38 minutes of your life that you just saved.

Good compressors aren't cheap. For most people it isn't advisable to buy one, because they only use it once every 3 months, and they spend 30 dollars on the weakest one they can find. Something that's going to work well isn't practical for someone who doesn't own air tools or use it often.

Yeah, it's great to fill tires at home. But when it takes 40 minutes......


What are you talikng about?! I have two air compressors. One was bought at Wal Mart(keep it in the trunk), another one at Target(for garage). They both are pretty fast. Now way it takes 40 minutes. 10 minutes at best to fill all 4 tires up. It's million times faster, more convinient and cheaper than waste your time and money going to Firestone. I wouldn't let those punks to get 1 feet near my car. I had service at Jiffy Lube once. They filled or should I say overfilled my tires with air - unevenly - and then did not put caps back on. Some great service! $5 bucks for that?!! I'd rather flush it down the toilet. No trust to teenager grease monkeys! They will manage to fudge up even such simple task as filling your tires with air. No no no!

 

[oilnoob425]

Originally Posted By: George7941
One small problem with these small compressors is that all the moisture in the ambient air which gets compressed goes into the tires.

With a compressor with a large tank, the compressed air goes into the tank first and cools down and some of the moisture condenses out, this is the moisture that drains out when the tank is drained. I don't like the thought of this moisture in my tires rusting steel rims and corroding aluminium rims.


Oh the horrors! How will I ever manage to find a strenght to go on after this shocking news! My life will never be the same. How about rain, snow and salt? Doesn't it corrode your "rims" as well? Let alone the whole underneath of your car, the muffler. Moisture from air is nothing in comparison to this. Your whole car will fall appart before your "rusty" rims will. Which you can't see from inside anyway. They will prolly outlive You.

No offence but seriously get a life nerd. It's ridiculous to see posts like this and others actually agreeing with this. Millions of people using these compressor and I don't see any mass disasters because of some moisture from air rusting their wheels. Life must be horrible for your if such little things making you uncomfortable.

 

[ThirdeYe]

Originally Posted By: oilnoob425
Originally Posted By: AcuraTech
Originally Posted By: ThirdeYe
10 minutes per tire


Are you kidding me? I need to waste 40 minutes filling tires like I need a hole in my head. Seriously, what a waste. Stop by the local Firestone dealer and have one of the general service punks fill up your tires, it'll take em' 2 minutes. Throw em' a $5 dollar tip for the 38 minutes of your life that you just saved.

Good compressors aren't cheap. For most people it isn't advisable to buy one, because they only use it once every 3 months, and they spend 30 dollars on the weakest one they can find. Something that's going to work well isn't practical for someone who doesn't own air tools or use it often.

Yeah, it's great to fill tires at home. But when it takes 40 minutes......


What are you talikng about?! I have two air compressors. One was bought at Wal Mart(keep it in the trunk), another one at Target(for garage). They both are pretty fast. Now way it takes 40 minutes. 10 minutes at best to fill all 4 tires up. It's million times faster, more convinient and cheaper than waste your time and money going to Firestone. I wouldn't let those punks to get 1 feet near my car. I had service at Jiffy Lube once. They filled or should I say overfilled my tires with air - unevenly - and then did not put caps back on. Some great service! $5 bucks for that?!! I'd rather flush it down the toilet. No trust to teenager grease monkeys! They will manage to fudge up even such simple task as filling your tires with air. No no no!


Yes there is a way it takes 40 minutes, two of his tires were almost flat, and he has 30-inch truck tires. On my Integra it only takes a few minutes per tire to top-off the pressure (i.e. if it's 5psi low, it takes under 2 minutes)