It’s true:

If the temp goes up 10 degrees, the pressure in your tires rises about 1 psi (pounds/square inch). If the temp goes down 10 degrees, tire pressure goes down by 1 psi.

There’s more: you lose about 1 psi over the course of a month if you don’t check and adjust your tire pressure. And for the first 20 minutes of drive time every day, tire pressure can increase by as much as 1 psi every five minutes!

A couple of minutes in the morning can keep your car rolling smoothly on road-worthy tires!

You want to keep on top of your car’s tire pressure because over-inflation will give you a bumpy ride. And you run the risk of damaging too-full tires if you hit a pothole or debris.

Under-inflation can cause even more problems. In addition to reducing gas mileage by as much at 5%, under-inflation increases the wear on your treads, reducing tread life by as much as 25%. Low tire pressure can result in loss of steering control, and increases the risk of hydroplaning on wet roads, or a blowout at high speeds.

A good way to avoid these problems is to build a little extra time into your morning routine so you can check your tire pressure before the outside temperature starts to rise, and before you drive anywhere.

Compare your “cold” reading to the manufacturer’s guidelines in your car’s owner’s manual. If the reading is too high, just let some air out of the stem. If it’s too low and you don’t have an air compressor at home, write down your readings and note how many psi you need to add, then when you have time during the day stop at a service station, take another reading, and add the psi you lacked in the morning.

And remember to check each tire. If your car is parked in partial shade, tires in direct sunlight will have a higher psi than tires that are shaded.

For more tips on keeping your car road-worthy, join me on March 17, 2012, for my next Car Care Clinic for Women and Teens. It’s free, you’ll get handouts from the National Car Care Council, and you’ll have a chance to get really familiar with what’s under the hood (and beneath the wheel wells) of your car.

FREE Car Care Clinic for Women and Teens
Sat., March 17
9:00 am – 11:00 am
Sonic, America’s Drive-In
7725 – 49^th St., N.
Pinellas Park

Click here to register online!

Or, call for information: 727-572-8877

Click here to visit our Calendar Item on American Towns!

You wouldn’t buy milk past its freshness or “sell by” date, you wouldn’t plant seeds that have been in the junk drawer for five years, so why buy tires that aren’t factory fresh?

You want your new tires to really be new, not “also rans” that have been on the shelf for half a decade.

Why? Isn’t a tire that hasn’t ever been used a “new” tire?

NO.

Even without hitting the road, the rubber tire sitting on the shelf waiting to be sold will deteriorate over time. In a worst case scenario, you could buy “new” tires that were manufactured seven years earlier, and the degraded rubber could cause the tire tread to separate while you’re driving on the highway.

So … how can you know whether you’re getting a new tire, or an old tire that’s never been used?

Check the Tire Identification Number. It’s on the sidewall of every tire sold, and it’s pretty easy to find. First, look for the letters “DOT” followed by a 4-character code. Following that code, or on the opposite sidewall, you’ll see an 8-character code, four letters and four numbers.

Look at the four numbers. The last two tell you what year the tire was manufactured, and the first two tell you what week of that year the tire was made. So, if you see “1211,” you know the tire was manufactured in the third or fourth week of March, 2011.

This is just one of the “tricks of the trade” I share with participants who come to my Car Care Clinics for women and teens.

The next one is scheduled for Saturday, October 1. Watch the website for details.

Hope Peterson

Hope Peterson, Certified Mechanic and owner of New Hope Auto & Truck Services

Happy Mother’s Day!

Remember the days when you were just learning to take care of your own car, and your Mom or Dad would remind you always to check the oil so you wouldn’t burn up your engine?

One of the things I’m always telling people, when I service their cars, introduce myself at networking meetings, participate in Chamber of Commerce events, or just chat about car care, is this:

It’s easier and less expensive to replace your oil, than to replace your engine.

Keeping the right level of fresh oil in your engine is easily the single most important thing you can do to prolong the life of your engine and keep it running at peak performance.

On this Mother’s Day, why not give your Mom a gift that will make car care the least of her worries: offer her a year’s worth of oil changes!

And to make the gift extra special, schedule those oil changes on a day when you can go out to lunch together.

Have a great Mother’s Day!

Hope Peterson