Nitrogen vs Compressed air: Which one is better for your tyres?
Introducion: Whenever you go to the petrol pump, you must have definitely noticed one thing: there is normal compressed air and there is nitrogen. Which one of the two is better, especially during the summer season? This article is going to be very important for you people.
In today's article, we will talk about nitrogen vs compressed air. At the end of the article, I will tell you whether nitrogen or compressed air is better, but before that, let us compare the two and see why people have become more interested in nitrogen these days. Earlier, nitrogen was very difficult to get, but now nitrogen is mostly available at petrol pumps, and compressed air is available for free, and nitrogen is a little expensive, and you will have to pay for it, so let us see which one is better. let me tell you what the difference is between nitrogen and compressed air. Nitrogen: If you breathe in a car or a bike, 90 to 100% of the nitrogen comes in concentration in the air, and if you fill normal compressed air, which we get for free or Rs. 10, then 78 percent nitrogen remains in it; the rest of the other gases remain in it, so the nitrogen that is present in normal compressed air is not pure; the nitrogen is at 78%, it is not in full concentration; if you breathe the same nitrogen, then you get nitrogen between 95 to 100%, so if we look in the atmosphere, the nitrogen present there is at 78%.
point no 1: which is the major difference between compressed air and nitrogen. If air is leaking from somewhere and it touches your hand or any body part, you might have felt that compressed air feels very cold. Wherever it is coming out, you will feel extremely cold from the direction of compressed air. Why?Because there is moisture in compressed air and 78% nitrogen is present in it and the nitrogen is dry but the remaining 22% concentration is of other gases, that moisture contains it, and when you fill compressed air in the tire, especially in cars with steel rims, you must have seen that rust gets formed in old rims. Why did that rust? Because many people used to circulate normal compressed air and because of that, there used to be moisture in it, and the moisture used to create rusting inside, and the same case happens in alloy wheels.
Although they do not rust so easily in alloy wheels. It does not come, but you must have noticed one thing: when you replace the tires of the car after driving it for 40-50 thousand km, then a white layer of oxidation gets formed inside the alloy wheels. Why does it happen? It happens because more compressed air is used in it, so the major difference between compressed air and nitrogen is due to moisture.
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If you consume nitrogen in tires, then the nitrogen kind is very dry, and because of being dry, there is no moisture in it, and because of this, caries is prevented, whereas caries occurs in wheel rims in compressed air.
Point no 2: The second difference which is the most important difference and I have observed this in practical life as well, generally only compressed air flows in my car and my friend's car is filled with nitrogen, it also has tyre pressure monitoring system, so the nitrogen which is filled in his car, I observed this thing that he did not check the air for month, the tyre pressure in his tyres remained absolutely stable due to the nitrogen, there was no shortage of air in the tyre and similarly the air in my tyres decreases by 15 psi, 10 psi the air decreases, there is no shortage in all the four tyres, it is not as if there is any leakage in the tyre but the compressed air is of its molecular They are small, and the molecules present in the compressed air are small, and because of them, they leak from the valve stem of the tire from where we fill air, or else they leak a little bit from the side walls. That is why you must have noticed that what happens in the cars, which we generally park and park after filling air, is that the air in the tires gradually decreases, and this happens for this reason: because they contain compressed air, and the molecules of compressed air are small, so it is easy for them to leak.
If we talk about nitrogen, why is the tire pressure so stable in nitrogen? Because its molecular size is a little bigger, and the meaning of a big molecular size is that it will also leak, but it will not leak at as fast a rate as compressed air does. A lot of air keeps leaking from everywhere, but the nitrogen in it will allow you to leak for a much longer time. You will get a flexibility that you will get peace of mind from that I have filled nitrogen and there is no puncture in the tire. If you have nitrogen, then you can run for 1 to 5 months, and the tire pressure remains absolutely stable.
Point no 3: Now let us come to the next difference, which is very important for summers: in summers, people say, Fill nitrogen in the tires; otherwise, the tires will burst." Why do people say so? Compressed air, as I said, contains moisture, and when we run the tires on the road, firstly in summer, the road remains very hot, and after that, when we run them, then due to traction, the tires start producing more heat when we are driving on the highway. When we are driving for a long time, then sometimes you should check the tires by touching them with your hand. After driving for at least 50-100 km at an average speed of 80-90, if you stop the tire and touch it with your hand, then you will come to know that the tire is too heated, and the same is the case when there is compressed air in the tires. There is moisture inside the tires. When the air inside gets heated up, due to the heat of the tire, the heat from the tire will go towards the air, the air will be hot, there will be moisture inside the air, and it will expand.
That's why people say that if you are running tires in compressed air during summers, you should keep checking the air and its pressure because the pressure increases a lot due to the moisture expanding, and during summers there are a lot of cases of tire busting, so I would recommend that you keep checking the pressure before changing the tires, and after that don't use retreaded tires at all; use good tires; if the wear limit of tires is reached, then throw away the tires; they are of no use to you; nitrogen You will see why tire pressure remains stable in nitrogen because it has thermal stability and temperature stability. There is dryness in the nitrogen, and due to being dry, the pressure remains stable. If you have filled 35 psi pressure in the tire, then it will remain the same; it will not make much difference.
Similarly, if you put second compressed air in it, then there are changes in the pressure of the tire. Keep in mind that we are talking about pressure and not the volume of the tire. The volume of air that you are filling is different, and the pressure is maintained the same. That is why you might also be confused about this that the company recommends keeping 35 psi in car tyres also and the thin tyres of bikes also have 30-35 psi pressure, so that is the pressure, the air in the tyre has the pressure that should be this much pressure, there is no volume of air in it So now you will understand that if you are driving a car or bike in the summer or traveling a lot on the highways, then nitrogen will be a better option there. Nitrogen will be worth it for you, but if your tire is in very bad condition and there are a lot of leaks in it, then you should avoid it. Nitrogen will be a waste of money for you because it will leak later.
Point no 4: For daily commuting, if you want, you can fill compressed air; it is a value-for-money option because it is much cheaper in India; you can easily fill compressed air; you can get it checked repeatedly; there is no issue; but if you are traveling on highways, you would feel that nitrogen is a better and safer option; although there is no major difference between compressed air and nitrogen, these small differences create a huge impact, so for safety, if you are traveling in the summer and you feel there is a lot of travel on the tires and highways, then it is better that you should supply nitrogen. Nitrogen Now when you are shifting from compressed air to nitrogen, first remove the compressed air completely and then fill nitrogen in it. If your bike is a high-performance bike, a superbike, or your car is high-performance, or you ride the car or bike very aggressively and drive at high speed for a long time, you are driving at 150-200 km/h for a long time; then it is better to fill nitrogen in it. I am recommending you fill nitrogen in both the bike and car because nitrogen has temperature stability, and the tire heats up and becomes very high at such high speeds, and when the tire heats up, then the nitrogen there is not under much pressure. If the tire increases, the chances of the tire bursting will be less for you.
If you are paying extra premium for nitrogen, then I will tell you in which cases you have to pay. You have to pay that when you drive a lot on highways, you drive a high performance vehicle in which there are high chances of tyre heat up and on top of that you cannot get the tyre pressure checked frequently, if you have a busy schedule and cannot get it checked frequently, then you should fill nitrogen once a month and take care to fill nitrogen only in good tyres, if the wear limit of tyres is completely exceeded and there are many small leaks in it, then that money of yours is going to be a waste because there is little nitrogen also it will leak in time.
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Conclusion: Now if you want to save money and travel by compressed air, then in which cases can that be done? If you travel in the city daily, you have some time while travelling, you can get the tyre pressure checked at the petrol pump, then compressed air is a better option for you because tyres do not heat up that much during city riding, generally the heating of tyres is more during highway riding, so I hope this article would be helpful for you.
