A lot of people are wanting to know what the benefits of filling your tires with nitrogen vs. air. Well there are 4 major benefits you will get by filling your tires with nitrogen. The benefits of nitrogen are that your tires will last longer, your fuel efficiency or MPG will increase, your car will be safer, and you will help save the environment! Continue reading on how nitrogen filled tires will help benefit you.
How Much Money Will I Save Filling My Tires With Nitrogen
Depending on how many miles you drive, your car’s current fuel efficiency MPG, and a few other minor variables, you will most likely save around $130.00/year on fuel, and around $70.00/year on tires. Which means you will save around $200.00/year! These numbers are based from driving 15,500 miles a year, on a car that gets around 20MPG. Continue reading to find out why nitrogen filled tires saves you $200 every year!
Increase Your Gas Mileage
How does nitrogen filled tires help improve your gas mileage? Regular air filled tires lose 1-3 PSI every month! Which makes your tires slightly more flat! Ever tried pushing a car that had flat tires? If you have then you know that it requires more work for you to move that car. Same applies to your car’s motor, it has to work harder to move your car when the tires are flat or even low. If the car’s engine has to work harder, your engine will consume more fuel! Nitrogen filled tires do not loose as much pressure. See the image at the very bottom right, see how regular air leaks through the tire’s rubber more than nitrogen does.
Regular air filled tires will also vary in air pressure in the tire, just by them being hot or cold. So if the temperature changes in your tire, the tire pressure changes as well. The longer you drive the hotter your tire becomes. Nitrogen filled tires will keep a more stable pressure when the tire’s temperatures change!
So filling your tires with nitrogen will improve your gas mileage by keeping your tire’s pressure more stable!
Increase the Life of Your Tires
Your tires will last longer when they are filled with nitrogen! Regular air inside of your tires will have nitrogen N2, oxygen O2, water vapor H2O, argon Ar, carbon dioxide CO2, neon Ne, helium He, methane CH4, krypton Kr, hydrogen H2, nitrous oxide N2, xenon Xe, ozone O3, nitrogen dioxide NO2, iodine I, carbon monoxide CO, and ammonia NH3. Some of these gases in the air will cause rubber to break down, dry crack, etc. Nitrogen doesn’t damage rubber. So if you fill your tires with air they will dry crack and also the tread will wear faster!
Filling your tires will nitrogen will not harm your rubber in the tire, and will increase the life of your tires, so you don’t have to buy tires as often!
Nitrogen Filled Tires are Safer
Some of you may have already figured out why nitrogen filled tires are safer from reading the information above, but for those of you that haven’t I will explain why nitrogen filled tires are safer. First of all in the section explaining that nitrogen filled tires increase your gas mileage, it says that air filled tires lose 1-3 PSI every month. Under-inflated tires are more prone to blowing out! So you are driving 65mph on the highway and your tire blows out because it is under-inflated! Filling tires with nitrogen will reduce the risk of a tire blowing out on you as it will maintain tire pressure.
Secondly, in the next section explaining how nitrogen increases your tire’s life, it says that regular air filled tires will start breaking down and dry cracking, which can cause a tire blow out as well.
Nitrogen Filled Tires Help Save the Environment
By switching to nitrogen filled tires vs. regular air filled tires, your car will burn less fuel, which will put off less emissions into the air we breathe. We will also use less tires, which will put less pollution in the air by making more tires.
Nitrogen Filled Tires Perform Better
If you are into performance on the street or track you want to have your tires filled with nitrogen as they maintain pressure at different temperatures better than regular air filled tires. When on the street or track racing you are putting a lot of stress on your tires, accelerating, breaking, etc. this causes your tires to get even hotter, which will change your tire’s air pressure. Filling your tires with nitrogen will not change pressures while the tire’s temperature changes!
Also while taking a turn at high speeds, your regular air filled tires will allow the tire to roll slightly, which creates resistance and slows you down, and possibly roll the tire off of your rim. Nitrogen filled tires will roll less, allowing you to maintain speeds through turns. Filling your tires with nitrogen will give your car better traction and handling!
Who Uses Nitrogen in Tires?
FAA requires all commercial air-crafts to have their tires filled with nitrogen. Nascar racers are required to have their tires filled with nitrogen, so they are safer, faster, change tires less, and use less fuel! Jay Leno’s car’s tires are also filled with nitrogen, and you know how much Jay Leno loves his cars!
Anyone can fill their tires with nitrogen to increase their tire’s life, safety, fuel mileage, and performance! So go green and save money by filling your tires with nitrogen today!
January 8th, 2010 at 8:51 PM
can i add regular air to a nitrogen filled tire and is $30 for 4 tires excessive
January 9th, 2010 at 12:46 PM
Yes, you can add regular air to a nitrogen filled tire, but you will not get the full benefits of having 100% nitrogen in your tires. I’ve seen most places charging anywhere from $2 – $10 per tire to fill with nitrogen. So $30 for 4 tires is $7.50 per tire, which isn’t too bad. A lot of tire shops will offer you life time refills if you buy their tires or even have some kind of work done to your tires, fixing flats, balancing, alignment, etc. You can go to http://www.getnitrogen.org and at the bottom center, type in your zip code. This will bring up all the nitrogen sellers in your area.
May 28th, 2010 at 11:28 PM
If tires filled with nitrogen lose 1 to 3 psi per month, how much will I be charge for the refill?
June 30th, 2010 at 9:19 PM
Tires inflated with regular air loose 1 – 3 PSI every month. Nitrogen filled tires hardly loose anything if the tires are good. Nitrogen will not leak through the rubber. Regular air can leak through the rubber even if there are no holes in the rubber.
October 29th, 2010 at 3:29 PM
First of all, air is 80 percent nitrogen to begin with. Air changes pressure as temperature changes. It’s stated as part of Boyle’s Law.
How can you make this statement:
“Filling your tires with nitrogen will not change pressures while the tire’s temperature changes.”
If air changes pressure when the temperature changes, and nitrogen makes up 4/5 of air, how can nitrogen itself not change pressures? And since nitrogen is still a gas, it still follows Boyle’s Law.
Please explain.
November 16th, 2010 at 12:58 AM
Yes you are correct, I phrased this wrong. Your nitrogen filled tires will fluctuate with temperature change. Your nitrogen filled tires will run cooler and will not fluctuate as much as regular air filled tires. Regular compressed air will have small amounts of moisture which will cause a greater fluctuation in pressure.
Thanks for pointing this out, I will change my information in the article above. Have a great day!
December 27th, 2010 at 6:11 PM
can i buy a nitrogen can to fill my own tires.
i have an air compressor anyway. so i fill my own tires. and most service stations dont charge to fill with air.
i check my air pressure every two weeks.
so what is the benifit in nitrogen for me.
January 2nd, 2011 at 2:51 AM
Yes you can buy nitrogen tanks and fill yourself. Most places that have welding and torch equipment would probably have nitrogen tanks as well. You could still benefit from nitrogen as it will not break down the rubber in the tires like normal air does. So your tires will last longer.
February 2nd, 2011 at 5:36 PM
just a question. If Nitrogen will not expand as much as normal air mixture, doew this mean i have to fill with higher pressure ? (ex. normal air 30psi => 32+ psi nitrogen ) ?
February 6th, 2011 at 11:54 PM
no.. 30psi = 30psi.. nitrogen just wont fluctuate as much as regular compressed air with temperatures changing.
February 14th, 2011 at 5:31 PM
yes, when the temperature raises the normal air will expand more, this means and increase in psi compare to nitrogen. Car manufacturers suggest a certain pressure, keeping in mind that their customers will use normal air. So what happens if they use nitrogen ? The only car that is designed to run only with nitrogen inflated tyres is the r35 skyline, with a reccomended pressure of 52. Compared to the 45psi of the r34 skylinee, it is a huge difference…
July 13th, 2011 at 10:30 AM
I just bought a new car that’s supposed to have nitrogen in the tires. My psi has been fluctuating by as much as 5 psi (morning/night). Is that normal for nitrogen?
July 14th, 2011 at 6:40 PM
Sherrie,
Nitrogen will fluctuate with temperature changes, but not as much as regular air. They may not have deflated the tires completely when filling with nitrogen and may have a slight amount of regular air or moisture still in the tires. I would say 2psi change should be all you see. I could be wrong though. But I do know a lot of places don’t inflate them properly.
They should deflate the tire completely fill, deflate, and fill again to make sure there is no regular air or moisture left in tires. Normal air may leak 1.5psi every month. So if there is regular air in your tires it will eventually leak out where the nitrogen will stay. So if your tires loose a bit of pressure and stay that way then there was air in your tires, but is now gone. After topping off your nitrogen after this you should be set.