So you\u2019re on the way out to your car, dressed for work, briefcase in one hand, coffee in the other. It\u2019s been a rough morning and you\u2019re leaving five minutes late, so you\u2019re thinking about possible shortcuts you could take. It\u2019s also been getting progressively colder, and today you can see your breath as you get in the car and turn it on. Then you\u2019re greeted with the last thing you want to see: the low tire pressure indicator.<\/p>\n
Around this time of year as the temperature is dropping, you won\u2019t be alone. Why does your tire pressure drop when it gets cold, and why is that a cause for concern? We have some answers.<\/p>\n
Checking your tire pressure is already something you ought to do on a regular basis. For every month that passes, your tires lose about<\/strong> 1 psi<\/strong> through natural air seepage. Beyond that, they will also lose or gain another 1 psi for every 10\u00b0F change in temperature<\/strong>. Simple physics explain this phenomenon. The compressed air in your tires is a gas which expands when heated and condenses when cooled. That\u2019s why tire pressure goes down when the weather gets colder.<\/p>\n It\u2019s important for you to stay on top of this because underinflated tires will:<\/p>\n \u2022 Decrease your vehicle\u2019s fuel economy According to the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration, some 600 fatalities and 33,000 injuries a year are the result of under-inflated tires. At the same time, the US Department of Energy claims Americans waste more than a billion gallons of gasoline while driving on under-inflated tires.<\/p>\n Some people are lucky because their cars will now automatically monitor tire pressure and tell them when it\u2019s getting low, but if your car doesn\u2019t have this feature, you\u2019ll want to check about once a month, or at least before you go on a long trip. The best time to check is first thing in the morning when your tires are still cold (both from ambient temperature and from not being driven on in the past several hours). That will give you the most accurate reading. You can consult your car\u2019s manual for the recommended tire pressure for that make and model.<\/p>\n For more information on tire pressure, you can visit the following links:<\/p>\n \u201cTire Safety and Maintenance\u201d \u2013 AAA Exchange<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cAir Pressure, Temperature Fluctuations\u201d \u2013 TireRack.com<\/a><\/p>\n Now is a great time to check, well in advance of any holiday traveling you might have planned. If you do find that your tire pressure is too low, we encourage you to visit us at any Leith Cars<\/a> store where our tire experts<\/a> can remedy your low pressure woes and get you back on the road again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" So you\u2019re on the way out to your car, dressed for work, briefcase in one hand, coffee in the other. It\u2019s been a rough morning and you\u2019re leaving five minutes late, so you\u2019re thinking about possible shortcuts you could take. It\u2019s also been getting progressively colder, and today you can see your breath as you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[472],"class_list":["post-1189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tutorials","tag-tutorials"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.leithcars.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n\u2022 Cause imprecise handling
\n\u2022 Wear unevenly along the edges of the tread
\n\u2022 In the worst case, overheat and fail at highway speeds<\/p>\n