YOU'RE TIRE, YOUR SAFETY

One of the parts that we often neglected in terms of maintaining our vehicle is the tire, we do not care about the condition of our tire as long as it keeps our vehicle rolling or until it came a time when we involve into an accident because of poor tire performance due to poor maintenance. Vehicle tire also deserve to be maintain to maximize the life and performance, before we get aware of the maintenance of tire, first we must look into the basic information about the vehicle tire.

Basically there are three types of tire construction, these are the bias ply construction, and bias belted construction and the radial ply construction. Each has its own advantages in terms of performance.

Bias Ply tires, the body ply construction is criss-cross over one another angle (on a bias) from the bead (the part that holds the tire on the rim) on one side to the bead on the other side. The advantage of this type of construction is that the tire flexes easily and gives a smooth, comfortable ride and has a great strength. The disadvantage is that, ply tires tend to squirm and scuff off tread rubber as they roll along, it usually wear faster than the other tire construction.

Bias belted tires, it has a bias body plies and a belt that runs around the circumference of the carcass, its features is a combination of bias ply and radial ply tires with fabric belts, The advantage of this type is that, it provide good traction in wet or dry weather, it also resist the squirm and road scrubbing, as a result it gives a long mileage with excellent handling characteristics.

Radial Ply tires, the body plies run straight across, from bead to bead at an angle of 90 degrees to the centerline of the tire-radially to the center of the tire. The advantage is that it gives long mileage, excellent stability, superior traction and good handling due to the belts that hold the thread flat on the road that provides resistance to squirming and scrubbing that is a major factor that contributes tire wear.

How to properly care and maintain your tire?

When replacing a tire, select a proper tire size and construction that matches the car manufacturers rim size and rating. Ask your tire dealer what tire size fits with your car manufacturer rim size.

Most tire damage is cause by wrong inflation pressure, use tire pressure gauge to check your tire pressure monthly, an estimated 5% pressure loss occurred every month.

Inflation pressure check must be done when the tire is still cold.

Do not run your vehicle with under-inflated tire. If the inflation pressure of the warm tire is less than the recommended cold inflation pressure, then the tire is under inflated.

Do not adjust your inflation pressure when your tire is warm, because inflation pressure on tire increase 20% during operation, it will only return back to its normal inflation pressure when it cools down.

Never remove the sealing valve cap installed on your tire, as it serves as a supplementary air seal.

Lastly rotate your tire in an interval of approximately every 8,000 km (5000 miles) for radial tires and every 5000 km (3000 miles) for bias tires. It is important as it will give your tire a longer life and even tire wears.