Nitrogen in Tires - Any Truckers Using Nitrogen?

Nitrogen in Tires? Is there any news out there about using nitrogen in tires? With fuel costs soaring, even a small increase in MPG is worthy of investigation. Maintaining proper tire pressure is the most critical component in fuel savings as tires that are only slightly under inflated increase drag and consequently reduce MPG efficiency.

Tire pressures should be checked at least monthly and proponents of using nitrogen state that while monthly checks are recommended, that nitrogen will not leak like air and may not need to be checked as often.

Nitrogen has been touted as the cure for under inflation because it will not seep out of tires as readily as oxygen due to the fact that nitrogen molecules are larger. Nitrogen is also said to reduce heat build-up and prevent oxidation on the inside of tires.

It is widely known that NASCAR uses nitrogen in their racing tires because a more constant tire pressure is maintained. Aircraft and the space shuttle also use nitrogen in their tires. TruckerToTrucker did a search of the Internet looking for success stories about any savings that could occur as a result of using nitrogen in tires and came up with very little, except for stories from folks who sell nitrogen and a few others with fleets of smaller trucks. We thought we might be able to share good news.

The cost for the initial fill-up with nitrogen seems to be about $5-10 dollars per tire, although refills are generally free. Of course you will have to visit the place where you obtained the nitrogen. At that cost one would want to realize a return on their investment in reduced fuel costs.

Is anybody doing this?