Here are some tips to fix a flat.

Always have a Spare and the Proper Tools
Make sure you always have a working spare and the proper tools.  The proper tools include a workable jack, tire on and other helpful items such as a safety cone to alert motorists (or flare), wheel blocks to keep other tires from moving, a rag and even a tire sealant or fix a flat kit and an air compressor. Fix a flat kits or sealants don’t necessarily fix your flat, but seal up the hole for a long enough time for you to get to the service station safely.

Fix a Flat on Level Ground
Do not try to fix a flat on an uphill or downhill grade.  You want your vehicle to be as flat as possible and unable to move.  When getting ready to fix a flat, make sure you are in a safe area from other traffic, use a flare or safety cone if necessary.  Put blocks or rocks in front or back of other tires to stop them from moving.  When jacking up your vehicle, make sure to follow the directions and to only place the jack where it is intended to be placed.  However, before you lift up the vehicle, it is a good idea to loosen the flat tire’s wheel nuts, the reason being is that when the jack has the car up in the air, turning the tire iron strongly can actually pull the car off the jack.  Now simply raise the car, resume loosening the wheel nuts and change your flat.

Choose the Right Size Wheels
If you are adding new rims, you have a choice of making your wheels a little bigger, and a little wider.  However, before doing so, make sure that the new tires will maximize performance and still be safe.  Adding wheels that are too big may actually decrease performance and safety.  And making your tires to wide- where they pop out from the sides can be illegal on some roads due to the fact there are no wheel wells to block debris being kicked up.  This is why before you purchase new rims, make sure the size fits your vehicle and is safe.

Choose the Right Materials
Today, you can purchase rims in a wide variety of materials.  Due to price, many materials such as titanium based or carbon based fibers may be out of your price range, however plenty of rims are can be made that are much lighter than stock ultimately giving you more performance.

Customize Your Design
While there are literally hundreds of designs available for when it comes to rims, if you are looking for something absolutely unique, there are a select few retailers that will help you design your own custom rims and create them.  Of course there is a price premium, but if you ever wanted to design your own rims, now you can.

Choose the Right Tire for Your Vehicle
While you can add some extra performance, by purchasing specialty tires, make sure that they fall into your vehicles range of limits.  Some might think that bigger or wider tires will offer more performance, unfortunately, there vehicles are not made for larger tires and can actually reduce performance and safety.  This is why you should always choose tires that are recommended for your vehicle.

Speed Kills Tires
While good tires are needed for high speeds, when you drive fast, you generate lots of heat which actually destroys the tires.  The faster you drive, usually the quicker your tread will wear out.

Keeping Your Tires Properly Inflated
One of the most important aspects of maintaining your tires is keeping them properly inflated.  Consult your owner’s manual for the proper PSI for your tires.  Not only will properly inflated tires offer safety, but good gas mileage as well.

Rotate Your Tires
Generally speaking, your tires can wear out unevenly, this is why it is important to rotate your tires.  Consult your manual on its tire rotation schedule and make sure that your car’s wheels are aligned properly.  Improper wheel alignment can destroy tires quickly causing tires to wear out unevenly in short time.  Generally speaking, tires should be rotated about twice per year or in 6K to 8K intervals.

Alloy Wheels and Their Main Benefits
Alloy wheels are usually made from aluminum and other composite metals.  This means that these types of wheels will usually weigh much less than the stock wheels that come with your vehicle.  While you might think that a loss of a few pounds won’t matter- it does.  For those in the know, the less weight you have at the end of your suspension component, the more performance you will gain not only in steering and handling, but braking as well.

Other benefits besides being much lighter than stock components is that most after-market alloy wheels are made for performance, they are designed to give your wheels the best breathing and heat dissipation possible.  If you have high performance (larger) brake pads, alloy wheels will definitely help when dissipating heat, making your car stop smoother and quicker.

Choosing the Right Alloy Wheels
One of the most important things to consider when choosing the right alloy wheels is the fit.  Every vehicle is different, so make sure you talk to your wheel professional on finding the right fit for your specific vehicle.  Make sure your vehicle’s bolts fit with the alloy wheels.  Things to consider are diameter threads and seatings- your wheel professional should be able to give you advice on these items.

While choosing alloy wheels for your vehicle does take a lot of research and thought, the investment in performance definitely pays off.  Besides looking great, a light weight, great fitting pair of alloy wheels will add excitement to your driving.

Since tires are one of the most important components of a well tuned car, choosing the right tire for your vehicle is essential. While a given vehicle can usually safely utilize several different sizes whether it is diameter or width, speed rating is an important and obvious feature. Here are some tips on choosing tires for your car based on speed rating.

Knowing the Speed Rating of Your Tire

On the side of your tire, there will generally be a mix of numbers and letters to let you know the exact specifications of a tire (For instance: P215/65R14 95H). The speed rating will be listed as the letter in the second group (95H). As you can see from the speed rating list below an H rating is good for speeds up to 130 mph which is perfect for practically all passenger cars.

General Tire Speed Ratings
Q- Up to 100mph
R- Up to 106mph
S- Up to 112mph
T- Up to 118mph
U- Up to 124mph
H- Up to 130mph
V- Up to 149mph
W- Up to 168mph
Y- Up to 186mph
Z- 149mph and over

For those looking to get the most performance possible and that take your vehicle on the track, you may want tires that exceed the normal limit for speed. Many tuners choose tires with a speed rating of Z (149 mph and over) and some tires that are considered exotic are sold with speed ratings of V, W and Y.

Before choosing tires you should firstly check the manual for specification on types of tires that are suitable for a particular vehicle. Do not use bigger tires than those recommended in the manual, as this will often make steering difficult. Also bear in mind that when changing from all-season tires to winter tires, it is usually best to replace all four tires at the same time with the same size and type of tire.

There are certain tires specifically designed to handle winter ice and snow, where they will perform in low temperature conditions as opposed to standard tires. These tires will be clearly labelled with a peaked mountain and snowflake symbol. In order to give better winter performance, the tread on snow tires will usually be softer which provides a greater grip in snowy or icy conditions, but will wear quickly in warmer weather.

Some winter tires are designed to accept the installation of metal studs for additional traction on icy surfaces, though use of these studs in limited and prohibited in some states due to increased road wear. However, it is also possible to avoid studs by purchasing tires made from special rubber compounds that not only handle ice and slow, but also cold and wet conditions. There are many winter tire options to suit your particular needs.

Somewhen in 2008, gas prices are soaring, so what do you do?

Do you drive a car? Are you worried with gas mileage?

Well, you should, people are trying to get more and more fuel efficient cars, taking less useless road trips, and they do anything they can just to reduce the money they spend on gas.

So, what do you know? One of the real threats for increasing fuel consumption is “under-inflated” tyres (or tires, whatever you wish).

Did you know these can reduce your gas mileage to up to 10%?

Yes, it’s insane, but real…

Well, a Tennesse based company called GoNitroTyre is taking takes tyre efficiency a little further, by providing a new product to fill your tyres, based on nitrogen instead of oxygen.

Here’s what GoNitroTyre’s founder Ken Lawton has to say about this:

GoNitroTyre Product Overview and Review:

We (GoNitroTyre) offer 2 different products:

• The TyreXtender aerosol top-off product – Used for refilling your tyres with nitrogen when they tend to lose pressure.
• The UltraFill 99+ system – Which allows you to replace oxygen in your tyres with up to 95% of nitrogen.

Where can I find it?

You can find the UltraFill 99+ system through GoNitroTyre’s site (unavailable at the time we’re publishing this due to an overwhelming demand).

The TyreXtender is available at a lot of automotive stores. (Did you know that this technology is currently being used by both the airline industry and NASCAR for their tyres?

Are there any Ecological benefits for using Nitrogen-Filled Tyres

People have been debating about whether these nitrogen powered tyres will improve or not gas mileage, however, Ken Lawton points out several other benefits of using nitrogen filled tyres:

• Almost 80% of our atmosphere is made up of Nitrogen, which makes it a naturally occurring element that we’re exposed to every single day.
• Nitrogen is a dry gas, and it’s more stable than oxygen and will cause a lot less leaks and rust.
• Nitrogen will last longer inside your tyres (up to 6 months without a top-off), allowing you more leeway with tyre pressure.
• You can expect up to 30% better tyre wear, this if those are properly inflated with nitrogen, which means less tyres to dispose of.
• Nitrogen may also be used to fill in non-car tyres, so you can improve the life of your bicycle, truck, trailer and motorcycle tyres.

Start using GoNitroTyre now!

Lawton says “I had been aware that NASCAR was using nitrogen in its car tyres”

…

“After a little investigation I’ve learned that fleet groups were also taking this advantage, so I wondered why consumers were not aware of it.”

…

“GoNitroTyre started to help with the transition from these specialized groups to consumers.”

Special Disposal Procedures

Ken Lawton tells us that recycling tyres is exactly the same process whether they’ve been filled with nitrogen or oxygen. Ken also wishes to dispel the theory that nitrogen filled tyres are more prone to explode.

“The parallels to nitrous oxide are misleading,” Lawton says; “Nitrogen does not support combustion, making it even safer than oxygen when it comes to blown tyres.”

Ecological Evolution of Company

According to Lawton: “With a raising concern on gas prices, the advocacy has been very gratifying; “We’ve identified who the biggest beneficiaries of this technology are, and are overly excited for more consumers to learn about the benefits of nitrogen-filled tyres.”

He then adds that one of the major goals was the creation of the top-off product so DIY’ers could easily maintain their own tyres.

Now, his new goal is to make nitrogen available everywhere and the build out will start this year, before oil prices get over $200…or maybe even 400 bucks…

The Best thing on running GoNitroTyre

“I like that we are a big part of helping consumers save money,” Lawton says; “We are giving back through savings on driving and car care while helping the environment at the same time. The environmental impact of driving is very important to us.”

So what’s up? What are you waiting for to put some Nitrogen in your tyres?

Alloy wheels make your car sexy, sporty and extremely gorgeous. Plus the fact that they shine when you’re on the move, people can’t help but stare at the car from the tires, the body to the driver. It’s your time to shine no matter what car you drive, alloy wheels gets their attention all the time. There are a lot of designs to choose from and you can choose to go wide or narrow. It’s all the same, really sexy.

On the 50s Pirelli tires were used on a number of Italian cars, and this tradition has continued today. In the 70s the company invented a new type of tire called the wide radial, and as a Pirelli tire it was made of high quality and served the Lancia racing team in their rally – it was custom designed because the power of the new car quickly outperformed the abilities of the tires used before it.

Pirelli P4000 Super Touring Tire

After this, so impressive was this new Pirelli tire, which Porsche adopted it for its 911 Turbo model and the tire itself has become a standard for auto racing and auto sport around the world. The latest example of a Pirelli tire being touted by world renowned racers is the 2004 Subaru and other competitors in the World Rally.

Most recently Pirelli tires have been adopted as the control tire for the World Rally and the British Rally – an honor that very few tire manufacturers have.

If it wasn’t for tires and wheels, you would have much slower speed limits – because at about 20 miles per hour on wooden steel tyres you will be shaken so violently that your jaw will clatter for a week or two. That might be a little exaggeration, but it is no exaggeration that your car would be worthless without tires on the wheels. There are some new tires now that use a special kind of rubber that will last much longer, however, if you really want to get the most life out of your tires and wheels, you might consider getting rebuilt tires. They are remanufactured in such a way that you can keep using them 10X as long by having them regularly rebuilt (once every one to two years).

So long as the main pneumatic area stays the same without damage the tire can function well beyond that of others who just toss them and get new tires for their wheels.