Air or Nitrogen when topping up tires

Air or Nitrogen when topping up tires

  • Air

  • Nitrogen

  • Don't Know

  • My dealer takes care of it


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ElpacoSV

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I'm also a strong defender of freedom of choice SCOPESYS! We all can do whatever we feels right for our cars! on my side, I'll stick with good old air and simply stating that fact wise I don't see advantages to put Nitrogen.
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SCOPESYS

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I'm also a strong defender of freedom of choice SCOPESYS! We all can do whatever we feels right for our cars! on my side, I'll stick with good old air and simply stating that fact wise I don't see advantages to put Nitrogen.
I totally agree -- you are free to do whatever you feel is right ...

What I am pointing out is that there IS a difference between Dry Nitrogen and moist air.. admittedly not a great difference, but there is one, as so well explained by a previous post by Jgreen16

https://www.civicx.com/threads/air-or-nitrogen-when-topping-up-tires.33249/page-2#post-573526

So when someone just cried BS, with no justification or reasonable explanation to why it is BS, and they are in fact wrong, I take exception, because they are misleading others.
 

BarracksSi

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I totally agree -- you are free to do whatever you feel is right ...

What I am pointing out is that there IS a difference between Dry Nitrogen and moist air.. admittedly not a great difference, but there is one, as so well explained by a previous post by Jgreen16

https://www.civicx.com/threads/air-or-nitrogen-when-topping-up-tires.33249/page-2#post-573526

So when someone just cried BS, with no justification or reasonable explanation to why it is BS, and they are in fact wrong, I take exception, because they are misleading others.
Not enough of a difference to make refilling and topping-up more of a hassle than it ever needs to be. That's why I call BS on "it's better to use nitrogen".

We weren't using nitrogen to fill tires in the old bias-ply days, so why should be do it now with much better steel-belted tires?
 
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SCOPESYS

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Not enough of a difference to make refilling and topping-up more of a hassle than it ever needs to be. That's why I call BS on "it's better to use nitrogen".

We weren't using nitrogen to fill tires in the old bias-ply days, so why should be do it now with much better steel-belted tires?
:bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs:

yeah .. More BS :rofl:

BS to everything ... :nixon: BS to Nitrogen, BS to OD, BS to Premium Audio, BS to Failing Clutches
BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS

:bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs:

Happy now, I totally agree with you -- It's all BS

(If you can't beat them, join them )
 
Last edited:

BarracksSi

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:bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs:

yeah .. More BS :rofl:

BS to everything ... :nixon: BS to Nitrogen, BS to OD, BS to Premium Audio, BS to Failing Clutches
BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS -- BS

:bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs::bs:

Happy now, I totally agree with you -- It's all BS

(If you can't beat them, join them )
Yeah, thanks for trolling the forum with a question that you already knew the answer to, OP.
 


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SCOPESYS

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Yeah, thanks for trolling the forum with a question that you already knew the answer to, OP.
Yes, I knew the basic answer, but it would seem that some did not, so maybe some that didn't know will find some responses in this tread to be useful information, and not just BS.

I certainly learned more about the subject from some of the more informative post.
 

Harlaquin

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This topic kills me. If you can get nitro refill for free knock yourself out. If you pay for it, you are a sucker. Anyone with medical training knows air is 78 percent nitrogen already from nature. Oxygen and air are basic medical courses. So your dealer is charging you for basically the same thing you are breathing. Most decent shops have air dryers on their compressors that they use to fill your tires for free. DRY 78% nitrogen air from mother nature. Paying someone for that extra 12% nitrogen is stupid. Regular air or nitrogen makes no difference as long as dry. Water is the main issue not the air.
 

Sgtstaadanko

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I fill accumulators with nitrogen every single day. We have a chart based on temperature for what pressure to fill the accumulator to. It's 100% a myth that nitrogen does not expand and contract with temperature.
 

latole

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Air is my choice and cheaper. Just to check each 3 months,
Nitrogen is a gimmick, you pay to save........
 

Benster

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Not enough of a difference to make refilling and topping-up more of a hassle than it ever needs to be. That's why I call BS on "it's better to use nitrogen".

We weren't using nitrogen to fill tires in the old bias-ply days, so why should be do it now with much better steel-belted tires?
We also weren't using fuel injection, high strength steels, plastics, etc before because it was new tech and expensive. It's not because your grandpa wasn't using them that it isn't good today. That's like saying a carburated engine will be better everywhere than fuel injection, which is completely false.

As a few people said already in this post, nitrogen will reduce pressure fluctuations and will not lose as much over time. Do you need it for daily driving? I don't think it's worth it. Is is good if you're racing? Heck yeah, you can set your tire pressures and they will change in a more predictable way than if you have moisture in them. They will go up and down in pressure, just like tires filled with air, but you will be able to control to what temp they go to better.

This is why people are using nitrogen, OEMs are using it so tires stay properly inflated longer so your aunt that doesn't know how a car works can drive the car for a year without checking anything.
 


latole

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Nitrogen is useful as Maintenance Minder but I don't need them.
 

BarracksSi

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We also weren't using fuel injection, high strength steels, plastics, etc before because it was new tech and expensive. It's not because your grandpa wasn't using them that it isn't good today. That's like saying a carburated engine will be better everywhere than fuel injection, which is completely false.

As a few people said already in this post, nitrogen will reduce pressure fluctuations and will not lose as much over time. Do you need it for daily driving? I don't think it's worth it. Is is good if you're racing? Heck yeah, you can set your tire pressures and they will change in a more predictable way than if you have moisture in them. They will go up and down in pressure, just like tires filled with air, but you will be able to control to what temp they go to better.

This is why people are using nitrogen, OEMs are using it so tires stay properly inflated longer so your aunt that doesn't know how a car works can drive the car for a year without checking anything.
Should be "dry air will reduce pressure fluctuations".

What's making the tire pressure change at all is the humidity of the air in the tire, not the elemental composition. The side effect of processing plain air into nitrogen is that it ends up drier than before.

But in regular daily driving, it just doesn't matter. Maybe it matters at Daytona or Monaco, but it sure as hell doesn't matter when picking up groceries.

Save the money, save the hassle, and forget about having easy daily maintenance being tied to a tire shop or dealership. Buy a portable 12v compressor and you've got properly-filled tires for years.
 

Benster

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exactly what I wrote my dude, totally agree with you. However, you never get dry air if you keep oxygen, even shops with air dryers don't get rid of all the moisture. Just ask my air tools about it I also mentionned in my earlier post that I don't think it's worth it for just street driving.
 

jgreen16

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exactly what I wrote my dude, totally agree with you. However, you never get dry air if you keep oxygen, even shops with air dryers don't get rid of all the moisture. Just ask my air tools about it I also mentionned in my earlier post that I don't think it's worth it for just street driving.
I'm not sure where you came up with "you will never get dry air if you keep oxygen", because that is completely false. Removing moisture has nothing to do with oxygen content. It is true that you will never get rid of all moisture, but you can get it down to less than 2 ppm by volume quite easily with the right type of air dryer.

The shops you reference most likely use refrigerated air dryers, which typically take the air to a dewpoint of 38 degrees F (3.3 C). With that dewpoint at around 100 psig of air pressure, you'll still end up with around 7500 ppm (0.75 %) moisture content. Far from moisture free.

The technologies that are capable of removing more moisture probably don't make sense from a cost standpoint, if you're just using the compressed air to run air tools, etc.
 

NonyaBisness

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Nitrogen is good for the shop that gets to charge you stupid amounts of money to hook your tires to a machine that sucks the air out and puts in Nitrogen, beyond that, well AIR is 78% nitrogen. the only people defending Nitrogen in passenger cars are people who got scammed into paying for a nitrogen refill but they are too narcissistic to admit they got scammed and will make up excuses to try to justify it with arguments like "you can check your tire pressures less often", they are trying to justify getting scammed because they are too lazy to properly maintain their cars, here's a secret, when you are getting gas ignore your instagram and do a walk around and check your cars tires and lights to ensure your car isn't a safety hazard.
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