Under pressure

My wife and I were out in her car yesterday. We were just loading the car with shopping when I noticed that one of her rear tyres looked pretty soft. Thus, we headed off to a nearby garage where we sidled up to the air pump.

The first three tyres all needed a bit of topping up, but then we got to the fourth one. On her car, the pressure required for the rear tyres is 28psi. We attached the air hose to the tyre nozzle. Instantly, you get a readout of the current tyre pressure on the machine. It said '7'. I thought there was a digit missing. The readout blinked and displayed '7'. The tyre, which should have been at 28psi was at 7psi. That's a quarter / 25% of what it should have been. Spectacular. I asked my wife if she'd felt like she'd been driving a boat recently and she admitted that the car had seemed a tad "spongy". A tad spongy? It's a surprise the bloody car wasn't cornering on it's sills.

Well, it's all inflated now and we actually suspect a slow puncture which we'll have looked at this week. So here's your safety tip for the week dear drivers. Check your tyres. And your oil. And your screenwash. And your lights. And your wipers. And your power steering fluid. And your shock absorbers. And your exhaust. And ...

Oh just get a bicycle.