Nitrogen in Tires
 

Is this a good idea or not? What are the pros/cons?

I fill my tires with a gas mixture that consists of approximately 80% nitrogen.

Pros: it's awesome!
cons: It doesn't help anything, and it costs money.

:lol:

Will someone explain to me why thats a good idea?

My friend owned a bike shop and also filled his race car's tires with it so he thought he'd try it in the bike tires too. He said it changed the ride to a much harsher rougher feel so he went back to good old LA smog.

Here's a fairly good look at the topic....

That's absurd. Did he fill the tires to a much higher pressure with the nitrogen? That's the only way it could have made any noticable difference.

Nitrogen in tires is just another way to rip off the ignorant and gullible. In very critical applications like race cars and jet airplanes nitrogen causes less variation of pressure vs. temperature. However this is due to the lower moisture content of nitrogen vs. ordinary air. Nitrogen causes less corrosion than air, but when was the last time you replaced an inner tube due to internal corrosion? Nitrogen is said to leak through rubber slower than air, but the difference is very small. And if cyclists were concerned with this they would not fill up with CO2 which leaks much faster than air!

Hill ... please.

Don't you feel ANY obligation to nurture the growth of urban legends?

;)

I agree with everything that you said, except that last bit.

While I take your point ... CO2 will get you home ... and that's all I ask of it.

Thread closed...

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=534147

check out page 3. or just read the whole thing.

He mistakenly used placebo gas.

That s--t works waaay better if you inhale it.

You're kidding, of course. :rolleyes:

You're thinking of nitrous oxide (aka "laughing gas").

Around here, it can heat up so quickly on spring days that the merchandise of some bike stores, inflated to capacity the night before in a freezing bike shop, will suffer a spontaneous blowout at 70 degrees.

Another urban legend. A tire filled to 110 psi at 32°F and heated to 70°F will go up to 126 psi. That's not near enough to cause a blow-off.

Race cars use nitrogen to limit the pressure variation when the tire heats up and cools down. Bicycles do not even come close to requiring this, even the Tour bikes (whose tires do not really see abnormal abuse). Air is 80% nitrogen to begin with. Even ole Lance uses straight air.

I wonder how fast this gas would leak

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qi7lTeXZu0o

Kam

Thanks for the info, everyone.

Nah, they do it because N2 is cheap, convenient, and not flammable!

(Issues with "pressure variation" are due to condensed water changing between a liquid and gas.)

He was probably not use to having his tires properly inflated.

How about using Hydrogen? The ultra-lightweight weenie-gas of choice! Check at the Big-Bang Bicycle Works in Lakehurst, NJ.