Now Serving Nitrogen At SuperTireGuy

Lots of advantages to inflating your moto tires with nitrogen gas.

http://www.mtdealer.com/t_inside.cfm?action=art_det&storyID=1207

Using nitrogen instead of compressed air has distinct advantages, which lead
to immediate benefits for the vehicle owner.

1. It has more mass, so it migrates through the tire three to four times
slower. The result: Tires hold their psi longer.

2. It runs about 20% cooler. Less heat results in less tire degradation.

3. Less tire pressure increase as the tire heats up.

4. It drastically reduces oxidation on the rim and inner-liner (nitrogen
systems almost totally eliminate oxygen -- the cause of oxidation -- from
the mix).

5. Another important factor in using nitrogen gas for tires is that
compressed nitrogen has virtually no moisture content.

Ever notice how much moisture comes out of a typical compressed air hose?
Lots. Ever drain your compressor tank and see the goop that comes out? Yuk.

If I need to fill my tires, auto or moto, and don't have a nitrogen source
available then ok, regular compressed air will be suffice. But when given a
choice nitrogen is clearly the better option.

Discount Motorcycle Tires & Service In Downtown San Francisco
http://supertireguy.com

 

WTF? The molecular weight of pure N2 is ~28 grams per mole. O2 (which
is 20% of the atm) is 32 gm/mole
I'd say that the mass per mole of air is higher than that of N2

How so?

So Nitrogen has its very own gas law instead of the ol' PV = nRT

I'll grant you this .. but since the outside of the tire (the one which
suffers the most wear and tear) is
exopsed to an oxygen rich atmosphere - does this really matter?

OK. But since I ride through puddles of water, is keeping the inside of
my tires dry that important?

 

Just following progress in the tire biz and this Nitrogen inflation option
offers benefits without any drawbacks. If the reasons for using Nitrogen
don't make sense to you that's ok, just use regular compressed air and check
your pressures on a regular basis.

Why Use Nitrogen?
Nitrogen is a dry, inert gas used to inflate airplane tires, off-road truck
tires, military vehicle tires, and race car tires for improved performance.
Oxygen in compressed air permeates through the wall of the tire, thus
reducing the tire's inflation pressure. During its journey through the tire
wall, oxygen oxidizes the rubber compounds in the tire, causing
under-inflation and deterioration of the rubber. Dry nitrogen will maintain
proper inflation pressure and will prevent auto-ignition, will not corrode
rims, and will help the tire to run cooler.

Improved Tire Life: Nitrogen will help to extend tire life by reducing
premature failure of the
tire. The causes of premature tire failure which are affected by nitrogen
include: Rubber deterioration by oxidation, Rim corrosion, Under-inflation,
Overheating, Pressure increase due to heat build up, Uneven wear due to
improper inflation.

 

Nitrogen is not inert -- its oxides are a major preoccupation of the
CARB. As to dry, neither nitrogen nor oxygen are wet -- the question
(to which I don't know the answer) is whether a pure nitrogen atmosphere
would hold water vapor better or worse than the nitrogen-oxygen one we
ordinarily breathe.

As to benefits without drawbacks, that would assume a zero cost of
extracting oxygen from the atmosphere. Not likely.

I don't know enough to say for sure that you're wrong, but what little I
know seems to suggest that nitrogen in your tires may be the 21st
century equivalent of St. Christopher on your dashboard.

Rich, Urban Biker

 

When you could use Helium.
Bike's weight is lowered due to lighter than air gas in tires, enhancing
acceleration to various locations where bikers can gather and talk
like chipmunks.
Sounds like a better deal to me.
Jim Stinnett
R1100RS
VTR1000
YZF R1
http://moto-rama.com

 

Nitrogen is not inert -- it is colorless, odorless, and non-flammable --
but not inert.

Reference please. I'm skeptical about there being a significant difference
between O2 and N2 tunneling through the various synthetic rubbers used
in tubeless tires.

 

How many surrealists does it take to fill a motorcycle's tires?

Two -- one to operate the valve on the Helium tank, the other
to hold the giraffe.

 

Actually, nitrogen is, by a slight margin, the smaller of the two
molecules and can be expected to sneak out slightly faster than
Oxygen. Jim Stinnett's suggestion of helium is not to be considered --
it leaks out very fast indeed.

Nitrogen is fairly inert, but I've never heard of a tire lasting long
enough for oxidation of the interior surfaces to have any effect
anyway.

Al Moore
DoD 734

 

Well, it IS what all the Moto-GP guys run. Why? apparently it does not
change much pressure at high temp. so if you like a 32 rear on the
track, its supposed to stay 32 the whole time. warm up lap, full tilt
boogie on the straights, and cooling down.

However, for the average rider, on the street, plain old air works
great.

I really like the St. Christopher analogy.

If you FEEL spending extra pennies helps, knowck yourself out. While
you are at it, send me $3, and I will say a special biker prayer for
you every night for 2 months.



--
Assuring you of my best intentions at all times,

Charles Statman
Rocket Scientist/Wonderboy/Women's Legs Shaven

DoD the Un-Numbered One

 

Numbers, dammit, we need numbers!

Alas, I don't have any.

It _is_ true that the techniques used to make industrial nitrogen tend
to be relatively good at excluding water and oil, neither of which is
helpful in a tire. But diffusion rates and heat generation? I don't think
those depend enough on gas composition to matter. Rubber gaskets seal
helium well enough for practical purposes, tires can't be much different.
Leaks are usually a bigger issue than diffusion through polymers.

A badly maintained air compressor can deliver visible water and oil with
the air, which surely will be avoided by using nitrogen, even if it's of
only commercial grade. For somebody at a racetrack a cylinder of nitrogen
might be a better choice than an unknown compressor and not much more
expensive.

Personally, I wouldn't _pay_ to put nitrogen in my tires. If I were in a
jam, and had a choice between a cylinder of industrial nitrogen and a
compressor with wet or oily air coming out, the bottled gas would be
worth considering.

bob prohaska

 

Nitrogen is a gas, and all gasses pretty much behave the same
with respect to pressure and temperature. Nitrogen is no different
from air in the respect.

 

Air is 78% nitrogen anyway.

 

A+ !

 

If that's really true, then you'd need to use a higher pressure in your
tires to start with, instead of what you're used to setting them at for
the track. The pressures the tire vendors normally recommend for the
track are based on the idea that once the tires and (consequently the
air inside them) have heated up they will _then_ be at optimal pressure
for the track.

 

Hear hear!

 

yay Denise!

correct. the vendors make suggestions at the track.

using nitrogen on the street is just like the squidlets burning race gas
and having bikes covered in sponsor stickers.

we need to sell them power bands, muffler bearings, and helmet grease.

--
Assuring you of my best intentions at all times,

Charles Statman
Rocket Scientist/Wonderboy/Women's Legs Shaven

DoD the Un-Numbered One

EMAIL: cstatman @ yahoo.com
BLOGGER: http://cstatman.blogspot.com/
WEB PAGE: http://home.comcast.net/~cstatman/

 

Here?

But the deal with nitrogen vs. air is that air contains water vapor
and nitrogen does not. Water vapor can condense out of air at lower
temperatures under pressure. Then the tyre heats up, and vaporizes the
condensed water, and... more pressure!

I had to drain the water out of my commercial air compressor at least
once a day whilst operating it (sandblasting auto body parts) because
water condensed out under pressure. I also had a drier loop on the
output to cool the air coming out of the compressor and then collect
the remaining water because otherwise my sandblaster nozzle would
occasionally spit water.

This is not of particular concern at the pressures that motorcycle
tyres operate, of course, unless you must regulate pressure within the
millibar in order to get the exact handling that you wish to get the
millisecond of advantage over a competitor on the race track. And it
is more of concern if you are in a swamp like Louisiana or Florida
where the ambient air contains enough water vapor that you can give
yourself a sponge bath by simply swatting your sponge at the air then
sponge yourself off with the now-wet sponge. (Okay, I exaggerate, but
only barely). But there is a reason other than fad that racers use
nitrogen to inflate their tyres -- it insures that they have no
condensate-caused issues.

- Elron

 

And of course they'll need the nitrogen tire-pressure gauges.
They look just like ordinary gauges, but they're much more expensive:
That's how you know they're for nitrogen.

 

Sounds like the problem is water vapor, not oxygen, in the tires
(tyres?). I would expect there are cheaper ways to remove the water
vapor from the air than to remove the oxygen -- perhaps a quicklime or
silica gel cartridge on the intake of your compressor?

Rich, Urban Biker

 

A compressor sucks in much more air than a desiccant pack could dry on the
intake. The usual approach is to place a dryer on the line on the tank
output; the previous poster also had a dryer loop between the compressor
head discharge and the tank. As air pressure decreases, water precipitates
out. Simple line dryers have an impeller in a polycarbonate jar that spins
and helps to flick the precipitation against the sides of the jar. This by
itself does a reasonable job of getting water out of the air. It's not as
dry as commercial grade bottled nitrogen, but it's certainly good enough
for tires...

ab