Last week in pictures: Replacing my car's tires

The tires of cars, or any other vehicle, are the only objects connecting a metal mass to the ground. Imagine dragging a mass of metal on the road without tires on the base. It will result in nothing short of a disaster, showing the importance of these pieces of rubber to the automobile industries and users. Interestingly, not many automobile users pay adequate attention to their vehicles. According to particular statistics released by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a paltry sum of 2% of all vehicle crashes are caused by issues that have to do with the vehicle itself. Out of this percentage, 35% are related to tire problems.

If we consider that the United States is a developed country where the average vehicle user is educated and financially buoyant enough to regularly maintain their vehicle, then we will admit that the percentage of tire-related accidents will be significantly higher in developing countries. For example, in Nigeria, only the rich are able to afford new tires for their vehicles while the average vehicle user relies on fairly used tires, popularly known as "tokunbo". Tokunbo tires refer to used tires that are imported from developed countries like the United States.

The tokunbo tires I have been using with my car were purchased a little over a year ago. When you consider that these tires may have been used for close to 10 years or more before they were imported here and sold as tokunbo, you will know that using these tires with a vehicle that is been driven regularly on Nigerian roads for more than 6 months is an invitation to troubles. Nevertheless, I used mine for more than a year. Thanks to careful driving, and perhaps, some luck on my side.

After careful consideration and considering my financial capacity, I decided to change my tires eventually this last week. Several factors had to be considered before eventually settling on the kind of tires to buy, even though they are all tokunbos. I had the option of buying regular passenger tires or truck (LT) tires. Even though truck tires cost almost double the price of passenger tires, they are more rugged, durable, hardly lose gauge, and specially built for tough road conditions that are typical of Nigerian roads. With passenger tires comes a regular visit to the tire technician, popularly known as vulcanizer down here, largely due to loss of air gauge and damages due to bad roads.

In other words, the actual cost of settling for passenger tires may be more than that of truck tires in the medium to long term. After careful consideration, I eventually settled for truck tires. I ended up spending about $18 on each tire. I genuinely hope that I don't have to worry about replacing my tires for the next one year, at least. Interestingly, 2 of the tires removed from my car were found to still be in good condition by the technician as far as his own standards of tires are concerned.

The truck tires gave my car a new healthy look, but I was duly advised by the technician to go for alignment if I want a relatively long lifespan for the tires. I took his advice and drove straight to the technician who conducted the alignment. Ended up spending about $1.5 for the alignment.