Tire Savers?

[AldeanFan]

Anyone use tire saver ramps?

I’ll be putting my mustang in to storage soon, it should be for about 6 months but sometimes life gets in the way and it will sit for a year or two. Last time I stored this car i knew the tires would need replacement anyway so I didn’t bother doing anything. I just put new tires on the car this year and don’t want them getting flat spots from sitting.

I considered jacking it up but I’d have to buy 4 more stands and the garage i store the car in is tight so maneuvering the jack will be a pain.



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[Stuart in MN]

Flat spotting was a problem in the old days with bias ply tires but it's not really an issue today. Just keep the tires inflated and they should be okay.

 

[uscarry45]

never have used them. I think taking them off the vehicle would be a better plan just by some 4x4 or larger would build some block and set the car on those

 

[rburke65]

Mine was stored for two years n no problems

 

[onewheat]

My Mustang sits a LOT - any time I break it out, if the tires seem to have flat-spotted at all, as soon as the tires warm up, it goes away. I wouldn't worry about it either.

 

[tym]

In addition to the above, you can cut some scrap bits of carpet and put them under the tires for extra anti-flatspotting insurance.

 

[fatjay]

My jaguar sits a lot, and it's the same thing. I pull it out and i have the flat spots. Once I warm the tires up though they go away. Usually 5-10 miles.

Addtionally, i've heard that keeping the suspension uncompressed is bad for it.

 

[2CRUZ]

I think I'll jack my 57 Chevy up this year and use Jack stands. My tires are old maybe 25 yrs old. I have inner tubes in them but so far they don't show any cracks or drying out. I just drive it to car shows not ver far.

 

[Vintage Veloce]

I think I'll jack my 57 Chevy up this year and use Jack stands. My tires are old maybe 25 yrs old. I have inner tubes in them but so far they don't show any cracks or drying out. I just drive it to car shows not ver far.

You should get new tires. Actually, you should have done it more than 15 years ago. Just saying...

 

[AldeanFan]

Well I went and bought the tire savers, $35 on e Bay. I figure it can’t hurt for that price.
I’ve never done anything to tires before storing and have never had any problems but then I’ve never stored a car with new tires.


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[rjacobs]

My 96 vette sits for months(6+ at a time) and it has R888R tires on it i.e. really really soft tires... Takes about 5 miles and whatever little flat spots had appeared are gone. My guess is your mustang has a lot harder tread compound on it so I wouldnt worry about it at all.

 

[LS6 Tommy]

My car is up on jack stands, too, but not so much for saving the tires as to be able to get under the car to work on it since it's a work in progress. I think it may also help keep mousies out of the car. I wish I had the money to take advantage of the deal Costco had on the Quick Jack.

Tommy

 

[rjacobs]

I wish I had the money to take advantage of the deal Costco had on the Quick Jack.

I was in the "quick jack boat" until a friend got one and I messed around with it and, for me, it was a hard pass.

If all you want it for is to be able to pull wheels and do an oil change, yea probably a good product, but for other work, I saw it being a pain in the *** since you have no access from the sides of the car. I mostly slide in and out under a car from the side. Coming in from the front or the rear is fairly rare for me...but im working in a standard 20ft deep 2 car garage so front access is hindered by a front wall and if I have the garage door closed, rear access is hindered.

Ill stick with my Esco flat top jack stands for now until I can afford a 2 post(and a place to put it).

 

[Bad00SS]

I'm **** so I use 3x3 carpet squares. Flat spotting is usually only an issue with bias ply tires but I still do it on radials. The Z06 sat a lot so I always had it parked on the squares as you can see in this photo.

Procedure for storing that car when it may sit for a year was: wash and detail it, fill it up with fresh fuel and some stabil fuel additive, check tire pressures, park it on the carpet squares, put the battery tender on it an lastly turn the garage furnace on 55 and then forget about the car till I'm ready. When I pull it back out I would change the oil first before driving. I was just very picky with that car.

 

[rjacobs]

Procedure for storing that car when it may sit for a year was: wash and detail it, fill it up with fresh fuel and some stabil fuel additive,

Side note:
Whats interesting is that with the C7 the engineers recommend storing them with less than 1/4 tank of fuel due to phosphorus build up on the fuel sending unit contactors. During normal use the contactors move around and self clean, but during storage with full tanks, the phosphorus builds up and then cant be removed that easily. They stated moisture/condensation isnt an issue because of the plastic fuel tanks.

The C5 and C6 I remember(one of my 07's had it) always had fuel sender issues and their fuel senders are basically same as the C7(as far as I know) but GM never, to my knowledge, made a statement about how to store the car fuel wise.

 

[SGKent]

my thought is that nitrogen is a bigger molecule and a tire looses pressure slower with it. I might consider inflating the tires with nitrogen to a few pounds less than the pressure marked on the tires and then storing it if you can't use jacks. That will keep them pressurized longer and reduce oxidization on the inside of the tire.

 

[rjacobs]

my thought is that nitrogen is a bigger molecule and a tire looses pressure slower with it. I might consider inflating the tires with nitrogen to a few pounds less than the pressure marked on the tires and then storing it if you can't use jacks. That will keep them pressurized longer and reduce oxidization on the inside of the tire.

"air" is already almost 80% nitrogen...

Ive yet to be convinced that "nitrogen fill" is anything other than a gimmick to charge more money. When you bring up the fact that air is already 80% nitrogen, the person "selling" you a nitro fill has no comeback...

he only thing I can see about nitrogen fill is that its supposedly more temperature stable(less pressure change with temp change than straight air). I fly airplanes for a living and they use nitrogen fill, but the tires are at like 200+ PSI and are subject to +100 to -60 temps... so this aspect, I understand, the rest, to me, is snake oil.

 

[ddawg16]

"air" is already almost 80% nitrogen...

Ive yet to be convinced that "nitrogen fill" is anything other than a gimmick to charge more money. When you bring up the fact that air is already 80% nitrogen, the person "selling" you a nitro fill has no comeback...

he only thing I can see about nitrogen fill is that its supposedly more temperature stable(less pressure change with temp change than straight air). I fly airplanes for a living and they use nitrogen fill, but the tires are at like 200+ PSI and are subject to +100 to -60 temps... so this aspect, I understand, the rest, to me, is snake oil.

^^ Yup ^^.

Another factor, that Nitrogen is also a lot dryer. Regular compressed air, even with a dryer, still has moisture in it. How many of us go through great pains to get the moisture out of our airlines in our garages? Do you think all those gas station air up points do anything?

The moisture in the air causes more issues than anything else.

With that said.....there is an advantage to using just nitrogen for tires if you keep them a long time.

The Oxygen in the air in the tire will slowly permeate out to the rubber....under normal operation, the tire gets hot and the O2 reacts with the rubber to start creating an oxide. Eventually it affects the bond between the outer rubber and inner steel belt area....one of the reasons you see tire separation. If you keep the tires less than 6 years.....really not an issue. But on older tires, it could degrade their health.

If you ride a MC....I can't imagine why you would run a tire more than 5-6 years anyway. Regardless if you use N or not.

 

[rlitman]

...The Oxygen in the air in the tire will slowly permeate out to the rubber....under normal operation, the tire gets hot and the O2 reacts with the rubber to start creating an oxide. Eventually it affects the bond between the outer rubber and inner steel belt area....one of the reasons you see tire separation...

I've heard this argument, but don't buy it. The issues I've seen from oxidation always appear on the outside. Ozone is a known cause of this sort of damage.

 

[rjacobs]

yea I dont buy the "air degrades the tire inside out" argument either.

I do subscribe to the theory of tread separation caused by heating and cooling cycles especially in under/over inflated or overloaded tires causing hot spots that eventually leads to bonds breaking down between layers.

Outside of wearing a tire out, dry rot cracking caused by sun is probably one of the biggest killers.

 

[redmondjp]

When I have a car sitting for a long time, I put the tires at their maximum rated pressure or maybe just a tad bit higher - usually around 50psi. This keeps them from deforming as much.