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Are Run Flat Tyres a Good or Bad Choice?
Some leading manufacturers are developing the adaption of using run flat tyres in the line up of their vehicles. This allows some advantages for the owner of the vehicle but like anything it comes with certain disadvantages. The main purpose for this added feature is the ability to drive a short amount of distance after suffering a puncture in the tyre to make it to a service station.
Doesn’t this sound great? You could be driving down the road, following a vehicle, when something falls off the vehicle in front of you and with no time to react. PPUUUUFFF! You don’t have time to change a tire or really don’t want to be out on this busy commute road attempting to fix your problem with motorist wheezing by.
So sure there are advantages to running these tyres. Like being able to continue along for a short amount to time until you can get to a safe service station to make repairs before a blow out happens. It is much easier to keep clean and have someone else do the work while you wait the short amount of time to get back on the road and on schedule. Even better, maybe you’re a person that needs the cargo room in the trunk of your car where usually the spare tyre is stored. With these special tyres there shouldn’t be any need to carry a spare along with you. This would allow you to use that most precious cargo room to your personal use.
As stated before, with everything there are certain disadvantages. To start with, what if you are on a trip or commute where the nearest service station is not as near as you would wish? These tyres will keep you running for a short amount of time, but like any tyre they will eventually breakdown causing you the need to replace the entire tyre. This could become costly if you have too many flats. Worst yet if you run too long on a flat tyre you could easily damage the rim and have the need to replace this costly feature that wouldn’t need to be done otherwise. This could all be prevented as long as you keep the spare tyre in the vehicle and change it out if you have a long distance to go after an incident. Wouldn’t that defeat the whole purpose of using these tyres? If you kept the spare and used it to prevent damage you would lose that extra cargo space, still have to change the tyre, and be right where you were before purchasing these tyres.
So as long as you have many service stations along your route or at least get a punctured tyre close to one, run flat tyres would be a good purchase for you. Otherwise, the wait for better technology with these tyres may be worthwhile.