Nitrogen in tires!? - Page 2

rayxi · #11 02-07-2006, 04:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hayaku

after reading that, how can you still say its snake oil? sure, they agreed it won't make much of a difference on grandma's roadmaster... but the benefits are real...

i have first hand experience on my race car. on a 110 degree (air temp) day in socal on desert racetrack, i ran nitrogen versus my buddies that had typical compressed air... after a 20 min session, my tires went up 2 lbs in pressure. EVERYONE else ran up 15-20 lbs of pressure...

so everyone else spent all of their rest sessions tweaking and tuning their tire pressures and suspension while i just rested...

and my car was fastest on the track with that group so the argument of me driving more conservative versus the rest of the attendees is not gonna work...

for those that don't drive hard or can't even feel the difference of uneven tire pressures (read 99% of drivers out there), nitrogen isn't going to do anything for their performance... but it is going to save the tires for those in very humid areas and store their cars alot...

By my calculation the tire temperature would have to increase from 110 F to 342 F to increase the tire pressure 20 lbs from a starting pressure of 35 lbs. I'm not a racer so I don't know if that's possible or not. Your tire temperature would have to be 132F to get a 2 lb increase in pressure, which seems reasonable.

My calculations do not account for the presence liquid water in the tire. It's more complicated in that case. Water vapor (humidity) make no difference as it behaves exactly as O2 or N2 behaves with regards to T vs P.

My take on the N2 fill is if it's free then why not - it can't hurt. If you have to pay and you are not racing then it's a waste of money. This is assuming you don't normally fill up your tires with a crappy air compressor that spits out slugs of liquid water once in a while because it doesn't have an air dryer.

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hayaku · #12 02-07-2006, 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rayxi

By my calculation the tire temperature would have to increase from 110 F to 342 F to increase the tire pressure 20 lbs from a starting pressure of 35 lbs. I'm not a racer so I don't know if that's possible or not. Your tire temperature would have to be 132F to get a 2 lb increase in pressure, which seems reasonable.

My calculations do not account for the presence liquid water in the tire. It's more complicated in that case. Water vapor (humidity) make no difference as it behaves exactly as O2 or N2 behaves with regards to T vs P.

My take on the N2 fill is if it's free then why not - it can't hurt. If you have to pay and you are not racing then it's a waste of money. This is assuming you don't normally fill up your tires with a crappy air compressor that spits out slugs of liquid water once in a while because it doesn't have an air dryer.

its hard to say.. air temp is different from track surface temp. and which is different from tire cord temp. i have to dig out my tire temps but 150 all across sounds right.

yes, compressed air has liquid in it. how many shops do you know actually drains their compressors everyday like they are supposed to? (i do btw). most tire shops i know only get their compressors drained when they call the air compressor technician to fix their compressor.. and i've seen buckets drained before...

vinuneuro · #13 02-07-2006, 12:21 PM

Bottom line, if you're on the street, all the cool kids are using nitrogen

.

We got our tires from CostCo because everything together it was cheaper than any other place. If we had gotten tires somewhere else, I don't think I would've gone out of my way to look for nitrogen.

rayxi · #14 02-07-2006, 12:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hayaku

its hard to say.. air temp is different from track surface temp. and which is different from tire cord temp. i have to dig out my tire temps but 150 all across sounds right.

yes, compressed air has liquid in it. how many shops do you know actually drains their compressors everyday like they are supposed to? (i do btw). most tire shops i know only get their compressors drained when they call the air compressor technician to fix their compressor.. and i've seen buckets drained before...

Well, there you go! The difference isn't N2 vs. Air it's dry vs. wet. N2 just happens to be a convenient source of dry gas. There's no magic in N2 itself.

Boatrider · #15 02-07-2006, 01:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by houdaman

hey guys i heard from a couple people that instead of air in tires, they put nitrogen in the tires. Its suppost to be the "new thing" that improves handling and doesnt leak out like air....
Anyone know any info about this?
sounds weird to me...

I've been doing it for years...and haven't realized it. I use a Nitrox mixture in my scuba tanks and have a tire inflator on my high pressure line, that I use to top off my tires when they are low.....

hayaku · #16 02-07-2006, 02:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rayxi

Well, there you go! The difference isn't N2 vs. Air it's dry vs. wet. N2 just happens to be a convenient source of dry gas. There's no magic in N2 itself.

yep, that is the whole point of using N2. because its dry. no rotting on the inside of the tire, no massive pressure increases, its still safe and non-bustable...

Parrothead · #17 02-07-2006, 04:25 PM

Room air is about 79% nitrogen as it is, so I'm not sure that 100% nitrogen is that big a deal.

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