Driving style has big impact on the fuel consumption of the vehicle. It has been proven aggressive driving makes the auto use more gas and there is really no saving even if the person has a fuel-efficient car.
But gas usage is not the only thing driving style affects. A bad driver wears out the whole car quickly and therefore has to pay more: get oil change more often, buy new tires, pay more for auto insurance, etc. Today we’ll talk about the tires and how to make them last longer.
There are five main techniques that would be useful if a person wanted to be gentle on tires:
1. Accelerate slowly. It is always interesting how quickly a vehicle can gain speed from starting point, but let the test drivers check this. When quick acceleration is applied, the front tires have too much pressure and wear out quickly. They are usually the ones that have to be changed more often anyway, so don’t try the front tires with hard acceleration.
It is also important to remember, no part of your car likes frequent acceleration anyway: extra pressure on the gas pedal adds more fuel to the engine causing a waste. Drive shaft and gearbox suffer from this as well – you wouldn’t want to replace them too often because of the high price.
2. Apply brakes gradually. It is almost the same as acceleration in the sense of high fuel usage and general car parts wear-out. As a rule autos have brake pads on the front tires that means they are again the ones to be dead first. The whole brake system suffers from this too. Be gentle on your brakes, so you could apply them hard in important emergency situation.
3. Watch out your corners. Turning is one of the hardest techniques for those who only start driving: they do not feel the auto as fully as experienced drivers do and make mistakes. At the same time even a driver that has his license for many year can bee too aggressive on the corners. It is better to drop the speed and turn slowly and carefully.
Fast turning makes the tire wear-out on the sides. It is even worse when the person corners one way harder than the other one because the tires wear out unevenly. Aggressive turning puts unnecessary pressure on suspension and steering system.
4. Follow the speed limit. Most of the drivers get excited when they get to an Interstate, but instead of going 70 mph as it is stated they run 80 mph and faster. High speed is good as a race track but not on city roads or highway. In addition, high speed does not only wear out the tires by itself, it also increases their temperature making the rubber even more vulnerable to the environmental impacts.
5. Keep the right inflation. This point does not have much to do with driving style, but with the maintenance of the auto. The tires have to be appropriately and equally inflated, other way they will get damaged quickly.
If there is not enough pressure, the temperature inside rises impacting the rubber. If the tire is over inflated, only some part of it touches the road instead of the whole area causing that part to be damaged quicker. The uneven tire pressure increases wear out as well, besides, it impacts the balance of the auto making it potentially dangerous in difficult situation.
Before starting a ride, walk around the car and check if all the tires are inflated and whether they are even or not. When you are at a gas station or auto service, check the pressure as well.