I agree 100%, nitrogen is good in your tires yeah yeah yeah I know all the facts and data behind it. Nissan sells it at thier steallership too. Big Deal.

My personal belief is putting Nitrogen in your tires is for lazy people that dont feel like checking there tires air pressure regulary and they want goofy little green caps.
Untill I see nitrogen refilling pumps at every gas station I'll pass.

Plus, I take care of my car. I rotate my tires and check my tire pressure all the time so my tires are not neglected. The air I replace durring my checks in not accounted for in any test case studies.

The nitrogen study should be; (2) very lazy people fill thier identical cars tires with Air and Nitrogen. The both drive the same 50 k. Who tires would last longer or be in better condition? Well DUH the nitrogen guy.
Why, because the guy running on just air ran out of air 20k ago because he was LAZY and did not check his tires air pressure.

 

PS I use laughing gas in my tires. When I get a flat I laugh my a$$ off because I still have my runflats on....HAHAHAHA

 

Would the guy running air run out or just 22% low since air is 78% nitrogen? Would the other gases drag the nitrogen out or leave on their own? Of course low tire pressure would cost more in gas so that 50k miles would take longer due to more stops for gas.
I think laughing gas is the best suggestion I've seen yet on this thread and since I've gotten enough chuckles off this thread I won't need to visit the local distributor to get mine.

 

My dealer wants $69.99+ tax to fill my tires with N2 . They said they'll fill it up anytime I needed. But I live an hour away from the dealer.

I politely declinded the offer.

 

I love these editorials. The Truth Cars, always great snarky commentary.

http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=6064

 

Take the $69 and put it toward a compressor in your garage, then you can fill you tires any time you like and you'll still get 78% nitrogen.

 

. . . or find a station that doesn't charge for air, and put the $69 towards beer.

 

What does nitrogen do for your beer?

 

Probably not much, but maybe we could fill our tires with beer carbonation. Of course if you drink enough beer you won't care what's in your tires and beer will fill your spare tire

 

If it's liquid nitrogen, you can make a beersicle!

 

cool !!

 

Funny that you should ask - using a nitrogen/CO2 mixture instead of the typical straight CO2 can actually make the bubbles in your beer travel *downward* in some circumstances, and it gives the beer a much creamier head. Here's more, from Cecil Adams of "The Straight Dope" fame.

 

Sorry to ressurect this thread, but here in PA, the legislators have passed a bill that gives car service businesses a $5,000 grant to buy equipment to
fill tires with nitrogen.

There's government money well spent, eh?

I guess the logic is that most people rarely check their tire pressures, and
chronically run their tires underinflated, which wastes fuel economy and
tire life and safety, and with nitrogen inflated tires, they'll lose pressure
more slowly, making the problem a little less rampant.
According to what I read, they only need to supply 95% nitrogen to qualify.
If some of the remaining 5% contains water vapour, then they have lost
all the purported benefits of using nitrogen to fill tires (the main benefit is
that the nitrogen is dry and free of water vapour).

 

Good grief.....more bills from ignorant legislators.

 

Total nonsense. You are hereby condemned to repeat high-school physics. Pay attention this time when they discuss Boyle's Law: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boyle's_law

 

Actually with pure nitrogen in the tires you will get a smaller pressure jump. It makes sense to use for extreme applications. IndyCar teams use nitrogen in the tires because a change of 1/2 psi makes a big difference when tolerences are very small. The nitrogen does expand and change the pressure but it changes less than air with moisture in it.

As for normal road use - I agree that it is stupid to pay someone a large amount of money to fill your tires with nitrogen. In any road car (even our beloved MINI) the change in pressure is pretty small and the relatively low heat generation over regular road use aaaaand the hard compunds of road tires make it impossible to notice either the change in pressure or some miracle gas keeping things even.

Keep the $69 and invest in a tire pressure guage and a compressor (or a roll of quaters for the gas station) and just check your tire pressure. It's cheaper and easier.

 

Nitrogen in tires is a great fuel saver! It lightens your wallet thus reducing the car's weight there by causing it to be moved by less fuel. Nitrogen? Not for me. I might try helium and see if the Mini will fly.

 

Regarding the suggestion of using an at home/portable compressor, does anyone have good ideas for make and model? I see that many of them plug into the cig lighter spot and others are wall plugs. Wondering if there is a good option which has both plugs. I would think a good compressor would pay for itself in a short while with gas station air machines costing $1 per go. Plus the convenience of addressing the tire pressure issue on pure cold tires in the garage.

 

Oh God, I thought this dude had been driven back down to the pits. This is the reason threads like this one need to be locked after a while. They get nowhere. I think Old Rick has been sitting around WAITING for someone to revive this thread so he can bring his "science" knowledge in here. I've been in war zones that weren't as dangerous as topics like this.

 

I bought a compressor/Slime bottle at Walmart for about $15.00. It's similar to this: http://www.walmart.com/ip/Slime-Road...r-Kit/14254132

It only plugs into the car, not the wall, but it works great.

 

Hey, I said I was sorry to revive it. Just thought the legislators needed some exposure so that their ignorance could be displayed.

By the way, here's the official link
http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal...12725&typeid=1

 

I believe that if you angle the tailpipe downwards you will cause the exhuast to lift the back of the car off the ground slightly, therefore reducing the rolling resistance and improving fuel economy. That should be the next law - all tailpipes must be angled downwards.

Crazy people.

 

Why are so many people against Nitrogen??? There are no negative side effects to using it. Granted the positive aspects aren't massive either. Unless you are somehow getting ripped off to get Nitrogen filled tires, it's something you should do. Both tire places I go to fill the tires with Nitrogen for free!

cristo,
As you point out, people neglect tire pressures, so having a push for Nitrogen to be more common makes sense as it's a easy way to reduce the issue. Are you upset at the amount of the grant? Or do you think money should be pushed more towards overall owner awareness? As for the 95% requirement, that still reduces the oxygen level to just a quarter of what it was before. That's still a pretty good decrease.

 

I don't use nitrogen since I check my pressures regularly, but unless someone puts off inflating a low tire until they can find a fill station with nitrogen, I don't really see a downside either.

That's assuming you get the nitrogen for free - there are still a lot of places (like my local MINI dealer) charging $35-40 to "flush and fill" a set of four tires with nitrogen.

 

I use propane. That way, if I get hungry while on the highway, my next meal is only the as far as the next road kill.