Do you love travelling? Yes? That's great.
Imagine you are on a road trip with a nice comfortable ride with your favourite music and with your loved ones.
Suddenly your vehicle's tyre blows out or loses air just because of a sharp nail.
What will you do at this time? Would you have a spare tyre handy?
Unless you have a spare ready in your car, you would be stuck in the middle of nowhere, waiting for help.
But, what if your vehicle gets a pair of tyres that run even if they are flat?
Amazing, right? That’s where a run-flat tyre enters the picture.
Before we dive in, what run-flat tyre are and why you need them. Let's first understand how they came into existence.
For the first time in tyre industry history, Michelin introduced the concept of a run-flat tyre in the mid-1930s. The sole purpose of this invention is just for a military vehicle.
The regular passenger cars didn't get this type of tyre due to the high manufacturing costs Later, some tyre manufacturers came forward and worked on the same technology to make the run-flat tyre available for regular passenger cars.
The run-flat tyre is one of the latest types of tyre enabled with Run-Flat Technology or RFT that allows you to continue your travelling even after a puncture. So, you can reach the nearest workshop without any problem.
That doesn't mean you can drive them for the long run. These tyres have some limitations too. You can run your vehicle at 80 km/hr max for 80 km. And within 80km you can find any workshop to repair the tyre.
Due to this functionality, these tyres were mandatory to fit in most luxurious cars.
As we already discussed, some manufacturers took a step forward and made run-flat tyres available for regular passenger cars. They have their unique code to identify tyre types and manufacturers, with additional manufacturing details. Some of them are below.
The run-flat tyre can run at a maximum speed of 80 km/hr or up to 50 mph after getting punctured. These tyres come in two prime types.
This type of tyre is the most commonly used. Same as regular tyre type, this system tyre also uses pressurized air to handle vehicle weight. The commonly used tyres leak air out immediately after getting hit with any sharp object and getting flat. On the other hand, these self-supporting tyres have a fallback safety plan in case of sudden puncture. Its stable sidewalls balance the vehicle weight and prevent the tyre cord from connecting the rim.
In this type of run-flat tyre system, the support ring is fabricated of hardened rubber. This rubber ring provides solid support to the entire tyre rim to carry the complete weight of the vehicle for low or no air pressure. The only drawback of this tyre system is that it allows you to drive a specific distance after the tyre gets flat. You can monitor air pressure on your car’s dashboard.
Yes, but make sure that your car has a Tyre Pressure Monitoring System. Tyre Pressure Monitoring System or TPMS is a vehicle alert system that alerts the driver about the decrease in Tyre Pressure.
Most luxurious cars already have enabled this type of system enabled. If you want to use those types of tyres you can install this TPMS in your car, and note that you have to do some work on your car suspension to get matched with run-flat tyre size.
The repair of the run-flat tyre is entirely dependent on the tyre manufacturer. If you detect the puncture early and this puncture has merely damaged the tyre then and only then is it possible to repair the tyre. Just like Michelin ZP tyres can get repaired only once with expert guidelines.
When it comes to comfort, run-flat tyres are the best choice. Running flat tyres provide the following benefits over regular tyres.
The run-flat tyres are expensive but are worth spending money on rather than facing a sudden puncture situation in the middle of nowhere. Especially if you live in desert-like areas.
Run-flat tyres are the perfect choice for everyone who is tired of getting punctured tyre regularly. It is no wonder then that they’re becoming ever more common in the market!
If you want to make sure that you’re opting for the best run-flats, then we strongly recommend that you check out some online reviews.
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