Crank57

I think I was in one of those linked threads as a supporter of the nitrogen in tires following. I still have to say it works for me, and I am satisfied. I haven't put it in my bike tires yet, but plan to. It works great in my car tires. That pressure monitoring gizmo on the dash has not alerted me to a low tire pressure in over a year. Used to go off about every other week.

The liquid nitrogen thing requires clarification. When you pressurize any gas to high enough pressure, it will turn into a liquid. At very high pressure comes high temperature. This heat will be lost to the surroundings over time and a liquified pressurized gas will attain ambient temperature as long as the pressure remains constant. The problem would be when the pressure is released into a tire the heat that was lost must be replaced so the gas/liquid/container will become very cold; proportional to the pressue it was stored at. Liquid nitrogen converting back into a gas will be cpld enough to make a rubber tire freeze into something like black glass. Not good. Don't look for portable nitrogen inflators any time soon. Just not practical.

Having said that, gaseous nitrogen at 100psi would not have properties much different from air at 100psi. The benefit for tires is that nitrogen does not leak out as fast, does not oxidize the rubber, and most importantly, does not contain water vapor. The water vapor in air is probably what causes most of the problems. As a tire gets hot or cool the water vapor in the air makes the pressure fluctuate much more than nitrogen or dry air would.