One of the most common questions that you get asked when you work in a tyre shop is “What pressure should I run my tyres at?”. Its a tricky one to answer as often what the car manufacturer recommends will give you a nice comfortable ride but not be the best for the tyres.

Personally I tend to run my tyres quite high. I have a Ford Falcon XR6 and run around 34 – 36 PSI in the tyres, that gives me two benefits – 1/ A nice firm ride 2/ Long lasting tyres.

It seems obvious when I mention it but is not always thought about – cooler tyres last longer. If you run your tyres too soft, they will heat up and hot rubber burns faster than cool rubber. If in doubt put a little extra in your tyres.

Here are my 3 commandments for tyre pressure.

• Front wheel drives – put 2 more pounds in your front tyres over the rear, the front is much heavier on a front wheel drive car. 34 and 32 would be a good pressure for medium vehicles, 32 and 30 for smaller front wheel drives.
• Big cars – Falcons, Maximas, Commodores and similar run at least 34 – 36 PSI in your tyres to achieve reasonable wear from them.
• 4WD vehicles – 40 PSI is a good guideline, big heavy vehicles with expensive tyres!

This entry was posted on Friday, June 18th, 2010 at 10:13 pm and is filed under 4WD Tyres, Car Tyres, Information. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.