Tyre Safety

You know the importance of healthy and safe tyres on your vehicle so we’re going help you keep them in tip top condition, whether they’re on a car, van, caravan or motor bike!

🚗 Depth of Tread
The 20p test is the quickest way to check your tread depth. According to Tyre Safe (who we also thank for the image), if you insert the coin into your tread and can see the outer edge you should get yourself to a garage and get your tyres replaced.

Of course there are other, more fancy, gadgets and gauges out there for checking your tread depth – pop into our branches, we’ve got some!

Why is it important?  Well, the more tread your tyre has the more it will grip the road – it’s designed to keep your tyre in contact with the road so when the tread starts to wear that contact lessens and risk of skids increase.

🚗 Tyre Pressure
Do you know what your tyre pressure should be?  If not check inside your door or fuel cap as most manufacturers will pop it there for ease when you’re checking your pressures.  There are two pressures – every day and heavy load.  For the most part you’ll do every day but remember if you’re lugging a load of stuff about you might need to adjust the pressure to suit the load.  Always increase or decrease pressure on cold tyres, before you start your journey.

Why is it important?  Correct tyre pressures can help with fuel efficiency, assist with even wear on the tyre, ensure safe handling of your vehicle and reduce the risk of sudden deflation. All good things!  Check your pressure regularly (that 20p that you check the treads with will come in handy here as most fuel stations will have air that costs 20p!).

🚗 Physical Check
Use your eyeballs!  Look over your tyres as you’re putting air in or checking the tread. Dig out any little stones/gravel that might be lodged in there, look for wear, threads, bulges – anything that might cause the tyre to not work optimally or potentially burst while you’re driving.

🚗 Check your spare
No point having a spare (for those manufacturers that still provide them) if it’s not ready for use.

🚗 Caravan Tyres
Caravan tyres are tiny compared to car or van tyres but are still expected to do the same job of connecting with the road, braking, swerving and cornering with the added requirement of playing a pivotal role in the caravan’s suspension system.

Download the handy guide to Caravan tyre safety from Tyre Safe (PDF, 1.7MB)

You need to look after caravan tyres to the same extent as your car – check the tread depth, keep them properly inflated to the correct pressure and give them the once over for obstructions and wear.

Here are some fun tyre facts for you:

🚗 For the first 25 odd years of cars, all tyres were white (bonus points to anyone who can tell us why WITHOUT asking Google!)
🚗 Early cars bolted the tyre to the wheel (that doesn’t sound like fun to change. In the rain!)
🚗 A run-flat tyre can support a car’s weight for up to 100 miles (check with your manufacturer if you have one!)
🚗 Lego out-produce all the car manufacturers, producing 306 million tyres annually.🚗 Every year we chuck out 250 million tyres.  Some are mulched, some are used for roads and some are remade into tyres!

Whether you have a car, van, caravan, motor bike or anything else with a tyre (with the exception of lego cars, probably!) Oak Road can help you to keep them in tip-top condition with gauges, cleaner, stuff to make them shiny and torches to see into dark spaces. Pop in to any branch and ask how we can help with tyre safety and upkeep.