It is very important that your vehicle’s tires have the correct pressure for reasons of safety, efficiency and reliability. Not doing so will lead to premature wear and shorter life of the tires, apart from being a safety hazard, especially with frequently used tires. Also, be sure that the tire pressure you use is a reliable one. Ask your tire professional about reputed brands. If you have a lot of vehicles to check, it might be a good idea to opt for a digital air pressure gauge.

Here is how you should measure tire pressure. First, if there are hubcaps on your wheels, you need to remove them, using a hubcap remover or something like a crowbar, so you can access the tire’s valve stem. Some automobiles have the valve stems accessible through the hubcap itself and so you must check to see if this is the case with your vehicle before removing the hubcap. If you have to remove it, keep it safely at the side before proceeding. Once you gain access to the valve, make sure you check it for any cracks or leaks. If you do find a fault, carry it over to your local tire maintenance facility to get it fixed. But do not take a reading before you fix it.

Now take off the valve stem cap slowly (to prevent any damage to the valve stem). Keep it in a safe place to retrieve later. Take the pressure gauge and place it over the valve stem. If you are using a manual pressure gauge, you will see the meter stick blow outward. If you are using a digital gauge, wait for a few more seconds. Then remove the pressure gauge from the valve stem and record the tire pressure reading that you see. Now take another measurement the same way, by placing the pressure gauge on the valve stem. Taking multiple readings helps you determine the reliability of your tire gauge as well as getting a more through reading of your tire pressures.

Once you are done taking the readings, replace the valve stem cap of the tire. Do the same for all four tires, either at the same time or do it for each tire individually after taking each reading. Also replace the hubcaps carefully, if you had to take them off to take the readings.

Whenever you are driving down the road, have you ever wondered about the fact that the only parts of your car that are in contact with the road are those four used tires? If not, you might not be giving them the importance or attention that they deserve in keeping you safe and sound during your travels.

Of course, as we know, tires work because of the air filled inside them, which is measured in pounds per square inch or PSI. The tire pressure will affect the quality of ride of your vehicle. A flat tire with no air pressure is as useful as having no tire. Whereas having too much pressure can result in a bumpy ride while too little pressure can cause sloppiness in handling and reheating of the tire itself. None of these conditions are desirable and can lead to mishaps while on the road.

So it is important that we frequently pay attention to the used tires and make sure the pressures are as they should be and not too high or not too low. For this, we can turn to the car owner’s manual where the recommended tire pressures for your vehicle are listed. Sometimes, they can also be listed on the car’s body panels too.

Make sure you check your tire pressures twice a month at least. This can be done for free at your local filling station. For most accurate reading, make sure you take the measurement after the car has been sitting overnight and before having driven too many miles. This is because temperature affects tire pressure, something we will discuss in a future article in depth. But basically, the more the wheels rotate on the ground and the faster the car goes, the more heat is generated in the used tires and this heat in turns leads to increase in the pressure inside the tire, thus giving you a false reading if you check the tire pressure immediately after coming off a long drive.

You can also check tire pressure at home if you have a tire pressure gauge. These are quite inexpensive and can be obtained for under $20 at most auto part stores.

Remember, if you take care of your used tires, they will take care of you!

The front tires on my SUV were severely worn, especially the left front tire, which had flat spots. Anytime you are driving really worn used tires you have a chance of getting a blow out, which could be very dangerous. So looking to save money, I went and replaced the two front tires with used tires. Both tires were Goodyear brand and had plenty of grip and thread left in them. I bought them in Newark, New Jersey, each for 40 dollars. I wound up giving each tire changer a five dollar tip, so the total for the two tires came to be 90 dollars. A pretty good temporary investment.

I hope this post gives you an idea of what you can expect the price of used tires to be in Newark, NJ. I did buy used tires once in Pennsylvania, and it was cheaper at the place I bought them for 35 for just one tire. A pretty good investment too as those tires were able to last for over a year before I had to get a fresher set of tires to replace them. If you do any shopping for used tires whether it be in New Jersey or any other state in the USA, leave a comment below so others can get a sense of the prices for used tires in their state or local area.

I am going to talk about a recent experience I had driving in the rain with used tires. The front tires in the Toyota Camry that I was driving, both tires were really worn out. I am talking about barely any thread left in the front tires. If you were to look at the tires, you could see that there is no “gap” like you would see. It was all pretty much like a used slick racing tire. Anyways the trip was quite long, I would say about 300 miles. It was not bad to drive when the rain was light, but when the rain picked up intensity, and there was more water on the highway, that’s when things started to get intense. Every time, I would change lanes, it felt like the car was hydroplaning, and was literally floating on the road. Even though I would be holding the wheel straight, the car would start to slowly veer to the right or to the left on its own. Luckily I knew not to overreact and use very smooth motions, and the trip was fine. Needless to say we did get some better tires on the car. We did get used tires on the car again but it was ones with much more thread left in it.

Is it safe to drive in the rain with used tires?

The biggest thing you must know is, it all depends on how much thread is left in your tires. If your tire is completely bald and there is no more thread left, youre tire will be like a slick tire, and you will definitely be hydroplaning wherever you are driving. It will be similar to driving on ice, and you will feel no control of your car once you begin hydroplanning. Even professional races who race in the rain can experience this, and believe me they will spin out! The more thread or gap in your tires that you have left, the more standing water your tires can take.

It’s been a while since my last blog post here, I’ve been meaning to do it but just been busy, so my apologies on that, I really should keep this used tires blog more up to date, but sometimes things don’t always go the way we want it to, but I am sure you already knew that. Anyhow, I’ve gotten a few emails from people asking about cheap tires for sale and where exactly the best place to get these cheap tires are. Hopefully I can provide that answer for you. If you take a look around my used tires website more specifically the archive page, you will find that I’ve blogged about this topic before. For example in the Cheap Used Tires post, which was my last blog post. Is an example of this question. Similar articles have also been written in the past so the archive page is always a great place to find solid information on previous articles.

I’ll give the short answer recap, use your local area as a resource. Check the newspapers, the local craigslists listings, usually there will be someone offering a very good deal on used tires, you just gotta be lucky that it matches the tires you are looking for. If you are in the city, usually you have local businesses that specialize in used tires and you can often find good deals.

Best of luck, hope you are able to find the used tires that you need! On a quick side note, I hope to get at least one blog post in the month of March.