When you buy an air compressor, you want it to pump up tyres, that goes without saying. What a lot of people don’t realise, is that many of them do more. Let’s look at a couple of those features, so you know what to look for when you’re looking at car tyre inflator reviews.

Pressure Check

It’s obvious when you know, but they aren’t just great for putting air into your tyres, they’re great for telling you whether you need to do so too. The more reputable brands that you find on the review sites are also particularly popular because they give a reliable pressure reading.

All you need to do is plug them into your power outlet socket in the car, connect the device to the tyre valve, and you’ll get a reading of the current tyre pressure in BAR, PSI or sometimes a few other measures of pressure.

Make sure you repeat for each tyre – sometimes you’ll find that a front tyre looks softer than a back tyre due to the weight of the engine, so always compare each tyre’s pressure to that recommended in the manufacturer’s handbook.

Warning Light

A great safety feature that’s common on compressors is an orange flashing light. That’s useful if your car electrics are misbehaving so you can’t use your hazards and you’re stopped in a risky place. Of course, you still need a power source so it may be that your 12V supply is unavailable too, but worth a try and could keep your family safer if disaster strikes.

Torch/Work Light

Similar to the warning light, there’s often a white light too – great for seeing under the bonnet at night in the event of a breakdown, or more likely to help you see what you’re doing to pump up a tyre in a dark lay-by or car park. There’s nothing worse than fumbling around i the dark trying to connect to a tyre valve, so it’s a really helpful added extra on the device.

Your car tyre inflator is therefore a really helpful safety device, offering more than just a way to pump up tyres on the move. When you’ve bought yours, be sure to familiarise yourself with all the features, as you may not have time to spend reading instructions when you find yourself needing them!

We hear it a lot – “I’ve got breakdown cover” or “I’ll just change the wheel”. Both might be true, and perfectly reasonable ways to get around a flat or soft tyre.

On the other hand, are you really going to get the AA or RAC out every time you need to pump up a tyre? Of course not!

What we all really do is drive around a little longer than we should and eventually remember to check the pressures when we next fill up.

Of course, to keep a vehicle at its safest, it should always be driven with tyres in the pressure range that’s recommended by the manufacturer, and that’s why we recommend buying an inexpensive car tyre inflator.

Before you ask, we don’t recommend any given make or model, just that you carry one around with you in the boot of your car. They don’t take up much space and are quick to learn to use too – that means that you can make sure you’re safe to continue your journey wherever you are in your car.

If you don’t know where to start, there’s a lot of help available. You could pop down to your local Halfords store and buy one there, as they’ve got helpful and knowledgable staff in virtually every decent sized town or city in the country. Having said that, it’s not unusually the cheapest or most convenient way to get your hands on one.

Amazon are a great option, and as usual offer some very competitive prices, probably cheaper than Halfords, but you don’t get the personal help from expert staff which is a problem if you don’t know what to buy.

If you’re needing that extra bit of help, take a look at the Amazon reviews, or a site like Car Tyre Inflator, which provide loads of information about the various makes and models and why you might choose one over another. It’s not just reviews of products, they also blog about issues relating to tyres and wider car safety too, making the site a really informative and entertaining read too! There’s plenty more of these sites out there too, just do a quick google search for air compressor reviews and you’ll find enough to read to keep you going for days.

To get in touch just drop us an email or drop into the workshop on Maine Street. We’re open during normal working hours, seven days a week.

Alternatively, drop us an email at talktous@bellasbestcookies.com!

We look forward to hearing all about you!

In recent years, new cars have been supplied with spare tyres less and less often, to the point that there’s now just a handful of remaining manufacturers continuing to do so.

While they are required to provide you with a means of continuing your journey, that often only means for the first year, which is why they will often give you a year’s breakdown cover included with a new vehicle – after that it’s up to you.

Waiting for hours at the roadside is far less convenient than swapping the dud tyre for the spare in the boot though – hardly a customer focused change on the part of the car makers.

What you can do though is to go back to the good old ways from the good old days. It’s almost always possible to add a spare wheel as an optional extra. Similarly, you can invest in a car tyre inflator too – something we’re very big fans of – hence the name of the site!