Bacura

My dealer now puts in nitrogen in all its cars. I know there is no downside except that I can't use air at the gas station. Theoretical advantages include less leakage due to nitrogen being a larger molecule. Also, less flamable since nitrogen doesn't support combusion. And finally, less water vapor. All of questionable benefit since air is 80% nitrogen anyway. My question is, does anyone have any real world experience either positive or negative. My gut feeling is that it's BS.

LexVan

Ask for helium next time to reduce unsprung weight. And cheaper than nitrogen. Car might squeak a little.

JamesKen

My dealer does the same and it is better but you will never notice. When you say you can't put in air at the gas station I would say you can or that nothing bad will happen if you mix the nitrogen with regular air. You will just lose some of the benefit. I have also heard you have less of a problem with air pressure with big swings in air temperature and less of a problem at the track when the tires heat up. I don't know if either of these things are true.

LexVan

This was all just covered last week, again, on the 997 Forum. The key is that you want dry air. Less moisture, yields a steadier tire pressure over a changing temperature gradient. All gases adhere to The Law Of Gases.

meine911

Less leakage and cooler are the main attributes. I don't think it's BS, but is it worth the hassle to find a nitrogen pump? Not for me.

JamesKen

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete...jsp?techid=191

chuck911

Lexvan nailed it. Using nitrogen is better not because nitrogen is better (air is already 80% N) but because it comes out of a bottle with no water vapor. In a way its a shame. I really like the squeaky car answer.

Noah Fect

I wonder how long a helium-filled tire would stay inflated. Probably not more than a few days at most...

fantom

Sure you can, without issues. Slower leakage about the only benefit.

CarManDSL

When I bought my 991S in June '12, the dealer had inflated the tires with N during PDI. They asked for $200.00!!

I laughed and didn't pay.

JamesKen

Wow, I wonder how many people would pay that.

chuck911

Lotta people don't know the air we breathe is 80% nitrogen. Scientific illiteracy, donthca know? I mean, look how many bought into the manmade global warming swindle. CO2, a trace element measured in ppm, is magically transformed into a world-destroyer simply by waving around the pseudo-scientific phrase "greenhouse gas". In order to believe this you had to not know what a greenhouse gas really is, that water vapor is the #1 greenhouse gas, that CO2 is only a small part of greenhouse gases, that termites, trees, volcanoes, cows and plankton - each- all make more greenhouse gases than man, and that solar output accounts for 90+% of temperature variation anyway. Man that is a LOT of scientific ignorance- and yet vast populations bought into it. That dealer is probably making money hand over fist. Bet he does the same deal on a Prius, tells them its saving the planet and they pay $400!

meine911

"Like" button pushed.

TheDatanator

Mine did the same but tried to poke me for $85. I closed my checkbook and laughed. They zeroed out that line item pronto.

JohnnyBahamas

So, Prius owners who REALLY care about the planet should demand that their tires be filled with water vapor.