Should I buy an air compressor, if so, which one?

[Drew106]

I have been using a small 12v tyre inflator to top up my tyres at home. I use it quite heavily, which is probably not what it is designed for, so it keeps blowing fuses in my cars!

So time to get a new one...

I was thinking one that connects to the mains would be better than a 12v. But they seem quite hard to find. In fact the only one I can find is this one: https://www.amazon.co.uk/RAC750-Powered-Inflator-S...

So now I'm thinking if I do that, should I spend a bit extra and get a small air compressor? This being I think the best one I can find for not too much money: https://www.sgs-engineering.com/sc6h-6-litre-oil-l... + an inflating gun should still be under £100.

It really is only for this one task - to inflate car tyres. But if I had the compressor maybe I would find other use for it in future.

So just curious to hear what people use for home tyre infation. Any product recommendations would be most welcome.

Really needs to connect by way of a mains plug as that's the only viable option at the moment.

TIA.

[Drew106]

Mark Benson said:

I have an SGS compressor, slightly larger than the one you linked to, it's not the last word in quality but it's good enough for what I need it for.

EDIT: Be aware though that a compressor is quite noisy

Edited by Mark Benson on Friday 22 September 15:26

Thanks. Still can't quite make up my mind between the SGS and the small Ring Inflator - it would probably meet my needs, but some dodgy reviews unfortunately.

ETA: Re the noise - this is a concern. Had a long trip to do this morning and one of the tyres needed a slight top up which I did with my 12v. Even with this relatively quiet devise I felt guilty given it was 6.30am.

justinio said:

Wouldnt it be better to get your tyres repaired if they are constantly deflating?

It is for general re-inflating. I check my tyres at least weekly - have a great little digital Sealey gauge. A few PSI is required here and there. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Edited by Drew106 on Friday 22 September 16:14

[Drew106]

DuraAce said:

If you want a compressor then buy one but you do not need one!

Agreed. I probably don't need one, but I have always had to top up tyres at some point so want to be able to do this at home easily. A 12v is not cutting the mustard anymore, so want a mains one which are close to compressor money anyway, so that's the reasoning.

GreenV8S said:

Are these ordinary car road tyres? If so that strikes me as an unusually high rate of loss.

Yip, normal road tyres.
What would you consider normal loss? In my experience it is anything from 0-2 PSI/month.

I have had issues with my car recently after putting on a new set of tyres. It was initially thought to be a faulty valve, which I've since had fixed, however still losing a little more than normal which I think could be corrosion, not sure, still investigating but two tyres in particular are inconsistent. Which is a PITA.

So it has meant having to inflate more than normal recently which is kind of what has brought on to compressor shopping. Something I've considered getting for a while now anyway.

---

Pistonheads is funny. You ask a question and somehow all this information gets extracted out of you. Like an interrogation. Not a complaint, just an observation...

It is somewhat changing the nature of my thread, but I'm going to roll with it...

What else could be causing higher than normal pressure loss? The specific problem recently has been an odd one. Very hard to predict - sometimes no loss at all for weeks, then they'll lose anything up to 10 PSI! top them up, fine again for while, then start losing. Very odd.

I've been back to the place that fitted the tyres, they reckoned it was the valves, so replaced them all. Which solved it for a while. Now they seem to be losing again. It is inconsistent though, so hard to pin point. Might be the valves again, so will probably pop back to the garage. Could it be corrosion? I would imagine that should be more of a consistent loss though? They're just little steelies, so replacing is probably easier than refurbishing.

[Drew106]

Dave. said:

I got one of these a couple of years ago - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Powerplus-6-33CFM-116psi-...

This one looks pretty good, thanks!

[Drew106]

Skyedriver said:

One of these, on offer at he moment?
https://www.aldi.co.uk/workzone-2-5hp-air-compress...
Might get one of these at £79.99 unless anyone can aim me at something better. Maybe second hand is a better option.
Comments?

I went for this one in the end: https://www.sgs-engineering.com/air-compressors/bu...

They also do a 24l: https://www.sgs-engineering.com/air-compressors/se... which is a little cheaper than the Aldi one.

The 6l bundle I got is a good little package with various attachments etc. I would say though the air line is a little short at 5m. So I'll probably order a longer one.

Delivered next day, so had a little play about with it last night. Seems very good build quality (out of the box anyway) and great pressure. It's pretty quite loud, but I guess they all are. It fills very quickly though as it's a small tank.

[Drew106]

paulrockliffe said:

I had an issue with one tyre slowly leaking air, needed topping up every few weeks. I injected about 20ml of Stans fluid into it and went for a drive, that sorted it out. Stans is mountain bike tube-less tyre sealant, it's basically latex. The drive spins it all around the tyre, the pressure forces it through any small gaps and it solidifies to plug the holes.

Did this 3 months ago, and not needed to put any air in since, so it's probably worth a try.

Had thought about some sort of sealant, but heard it's not too good for the tyres.

I would love to get the bottom of it though, I don't know why they're losing pressure. I was back to the tyre place last week and they couldn't find anything wrong with the tyres which is very frustrating.

They refilled the tyres with nitrogen to see if that solves it, but it doesn't appear to have. I will have to go back again when I have time.

For now I'm just topping up with my new compressor!

[Drew106]

GreenV8S said:

The problem that Nitrogen inflation cures is that the garage owner's wallet does not have enough money in and yours has too much.

lol. That was always my thinking about nitrogen fills as well. It's a bit of a gimmick to increase add-on sales with new tyres.

Reading about it online though there does seem to at least be a scientific basis for the nitrogen fill possibly preventing pressure loss - as nitrogen molecules are larger than air.

Anyway the garage hasn't charged me for any of this, so no harm in trying. Been back twice since having the tyres fitted in July. Fitted new valves last time, this time they did the nitrogen fill.

[Drew106]

GreenV8S said:

Drew106 said:

there does seem to at least be a scientific basis for the nitrogen fill possibly preventing pressure loss

All the claims about leaking and tyre degradation and thermal stability and humidity and so on are utterly irrelevant. The scientific basis for all of these makes very tenuous sense if you have a budget of millions of quid and want every potential thousandth of a percent improvement in every single aspect of the vehicle. For the other 99.999% of the population it is complete hogwash. They offer it as an extra thing to put on the bill, and so that once you've paid you will take up their offer of 'free checks' etc so they have an opportunity to sell more stuff to you in future. The reality is that as well as giving no benefit at all, it also encourages people to think of tyre pressure as something that the supplier checks from time to time and not something drivers should be monitoring for themselves at regular intervals.

You left off the important part of my quote though. There is a possibility that it might prevent or slow pressure loss.

I am in agreement with you that it is unnecessary to fill your road cars tyres with nitrogen.

[Drew106]

E-bmw said:

Don't forget that all F1 teams use Nitrogen & they are always complaining about tyre temperatures dropping and reducing pressures, so although it is not to the same extent Nitrogen still has the same temperature issues as air.

I was pretty dubious that a nitrogen fill would solve the pressure loss issues and in fact it has not. I would imagine the difference in size of the holes, so that air can escape and nitrogen can not, would have to be pretty microscopic (Disclaimer: not a scientist )

But as they were not charging there was no harm trying. I even got some nice green dust caps lol.

[Drew106]

GreenV8S said:

Did they suck the fresh air out of your tyres before they inflated them with Nitrogen? If not, a third of the gas in the tyre is still fresh air in any case so you're only getting two thirds of whatever theoretical benefit they were claiming - don't suppose they mentioned that. Not that it matters - two thirds of nothing is still nothing.

Yeah, purged and refilled.

It was just another thing to try, having failed to find other causes of the pressure loss. Don't think anyone was expecting miracles or 'claiming' huge benefits.

[Drew106]

Greg_D said:

get a soapy water solution and spray onto the bead and all over the tyres to see if anything bubbles up.

Thanks.
I did try this, but couldn't see anything. I would like to have another go over more thoroughly though.

[Drew106]

E-bmw said:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AIR-TOOLS-24L-LITRE-AIR-...

This looks like a good one. Cheap price!

I bought the 6l one from SGS in the end, about £100 inc. VAT for a package with various attachments. Seems a decent piece of kit so far for what I need. Did have to order a longer air hose though as the 4m coil one was a bit too short.

Thought a 24l would take up too much space and be a little overkill for what I need. Also as they're pretty loud a 24l would take longer to fill, therefore probably ps off the neighbors more.

So far I've used it to top up the tyres a couple of times and blow up a Yoga ball lol. Made short work of that.

[Drew106]

foggy said:

One thing I’d love air at home for is blowing stuff off - grime off of car parts, grass and muck off shoes and the mower, drying stuff off etc. as well as inflating tyres. What small quiet(ish) compressor might do the job?

Part of the reason I got mine as well. It comes in very handy for blowing dust & dirt of car parts etc. I would imagine any size would be sufficient for this. My 6l tank is certainly enough.