4 BIG Mistakes People Make With Tire Replacement and How YOU Can Avoid Them

Properly functional tires are a basic necessity for any car owner. If you’ve ever endured the curse of limping home on a punctured tire, you’ll have seen first hand what a massive difference just one messed-up tire can have on a vehicle’s performance and handling. 

You’d think that something as ubiquitous as tire replacement would be pretty standard, but in reality it’s a process fraught with dangers, both to the integrity of the wheel - and the human being handling it! 

Here are four BIG mistakes that most people make when getting a tire or tires replaced - and how you can be the wise old owl that avoids all of them.

1 - Replacing the tire yourself

This may seem like a no-brainer, but there are people who attempt this to save money. The basic process of removing and replacing a vehicle tire is not wholly unlike that used to replace a bicycle tire - and many people make the mistake of thinking it’s just as straightforward and safe. This is a massive mistake because while both types of tire are pressurized, the pressure levels involved with a vehicle tire are exponentially higher. If not handled correctly, the tire can literally explode off the wheel, sending the tire in one direction and the wheel in the other - and the person handling them WILL be caught in the path of one. Considering most tires and wheels weigh about 22 pounds each, that is not something you want to be in the path of when it’s hurtling towards you at speed. There’s a reason professional tire installers exist - and it’s not just for convenience.

2 - Choosing a tire with an incompatible speed rating

Every vehicle is an individual, finely tuned to accomplish a purpose, whether that is carrying your family around in comfort, bumping over rough terrain, or speeding around a track. As such, each vehicle’s wheels require a certain type of tire, graded to match the speed profile of the vehicle. Particularly with a high performance vehicle, this is an area where it’s important not to try to cut corners (no pun intended!). Choosing a tire that doesn’t fit the manufacturer’s suggested speed rating WILL result in performance issues. A good professional tire installer will know not just the suggested speed rating for tires for your vehicle, but also how much wiggle room you have within that range. 

3 - Replacing or mixing Run-Flat tires with conventional tires

Many high-performance vehicles require Run-Flat tires for optimal handling and performance. Mixing Run-Flats with conventional tires will result in unpredictable handling at the very least - and can be dangerous, due to the unpredictable response of the vehicle. Run-Flats should not be mixed with or replaced by conventional tires, unless it’s an emergency and only on a temporary basis. If you have to use a conventional tire on an emergency/temporary basis, make sure that its size, load capacity, inflation pressure, and speed rating specs meet the manufacturer requirements for the vehicle. Always replace any conventional tire with an appropriate Run-Flat tire as soon as possible.

4 - Make sure your tires are properly inflated before leaving the tire installer

This may seem really obvious, but it is shocking the number of so-called professional tire installers who allow a vehicle to be driven away with too low or too high tire pressure, simply because they didn’t know what pressure it should be or they didn’t check all four tires were balanced. Check your owner’s manual or online to see what your vehicle’s tire pressure should be (front and back) before driving it away, and ask your tire installer to verify that the tires are within that range. Any professional tire installer worth his or her salt will want to make sure you are getting the highest quality work and results from them.

5 - Wasting half a day going to a store-based tire installer

Yes, we know said four big mistakes, but that’s just how generous and overachieving we are! But seriously, although the actual process of having new tires installed only takes about an hour or so (if that), the time involved for you to drive your car over to the installer, sit and wait while they finish work on other cars (even if you have an appointment) and then go back and forth between your car and others, before finally releasing it back to your custody, can take literally hours. Hours you could be spending doing something (anything) else. Salt City Wheels are different. Not only do we give you the highest quality work and service, we bring this DIRECTLY TO YOU with our mobile tire replacement workshop. You don’t have to leave your home office or sofa for even a minute. We will do all the work at your home or place of work or wherever is convenient to you. All for the same cost as taking your car to a brick-and-mortar installer. Now THAT’S a no-brainer!

If you need a tire or all four replaced, give the wheel experts at Salt City Wheels a call today at 801 425 3044. We have over a decade of experience handling, repairing, replacing, refinishing and re-tiring (is that a word?) wheels, and our customer reviews on Yelp and Google Reviews show just how much our customers love our work. Give us a call today for your FREE tire replacement consultation!