mwar99

Yes but you have to buy the tires from them and I have never seen them have tires I would want to buy...

And I also assume it isn't "free" they just don't charge a separate fee for it. Many things "free" usually are built in to a higher cost to the product you are purchasing. That said it is Costco so the consumer cost is prpbably cheaper overall than a tire shop. I would be curious to know what the cost at Costco would be without Nitrogen fill ups.

Diogenes

Customer or not, if you drive into COSTCO and ask them to check your tire pressures, they'll fill them if needed...with nitrogen. No charge, whether your tires were purchased there or not. Same with Discount Tire. I've been getting top of the line Michelins at Costco for years. Never had a complaint with their service or pricing.

MileHighJC

Not all the Discount Tire's provide Nitrogen... the one here locally does not which is too bad... Especially since that is who I am considering buying the Bridgestones from.

das2.7t

After buying tires for years at Tire Rack, I finally figured out that Costco can and will special order any tire you want with no up charge. More importantly, their brand specials carry over to the special orders. Typically, it's $70 on a set of 4 Michelins and buy 3 and get the 4th free for Bridgstones with the promos running twice per year. Other brands have similar specials. I bought my Michelin Pilot Sport PS/2's and Bridgestone Blizzak WS70's from there and each only took a couple of days to come in. They throw in lifetime balancing too so it's a great deal. Mounting and initial balancing (with Nitrogen, of course) is crazy low at $14 per wheel. At this point, I don't know why I would ever go anywhere else.

MileHighJC

For what it is worth, be careful... I'm not saying that this would happen at Costco, but I purchased a set of tires from another large big box discounter. As I drove away, I heard a banging noise, so I went back and discovered they had sheared off one of the lugs, and cross threaded another. They took the car back in, gave me a ride home, and I picked it up "repaired" the next day. Three weeks later, I noticed something bright along the edge of the tire. It was the steel belt - the tire had worn all the way down. This time, they paid a reputable shop to repair the damage, and replaced the ruined tire.

They did all the right things to resolve their screw ups, but in the end, I was without my car for over a week, and it cost them over $500 to sell me that set of tires. At the bottom of it all was a poorly trained tech, no doubt working for close to minimum wage.

Suffice it to say I would not want this happening to my Audi...

das2.7t

That stinks. While I can't say something like that would not happen at Costco, I'd hazard to guess it would be unlikely. Their tire technicians are all ASE certified and, as employee-owners, typically remain for years and certianly don't make anywhere near minimum wage (simple curiousity web search says ~$15/hr or $33k per year). They send their techs to training provided by the various manufacturers and are tested yearly to maintain their ASE certs. The guy who installed my Blizzaks had just returned from the technician version of the Bridgestone winter driving school and was very excited about my A6/Blizzak setup and the prospects of driving in Western Maryland in the winter. Too bad the winter was such a dud.

All that said, I am not a COSTCO apologist but I am impressed by their tire business.

MileHighJC

Good to hear one the ASE certs, that definitely would give me more comfort!

newmoon

I have found both air and nitrogen increase the same 0.5-1 psi for every 10 F increase in ambient temperature, and 3-5 psi from heating up while driving.

The altitude and resulting drop in atmospheric pressure should not affect the internal tire pressure much. If the tire were a flexible balloon it would expand in volume, so that the internal pressure would decrease to equalize with the atmospheric pressure. But the tire is hard rubber so the volume doesn't change much and the internal pressure should remain the same.

The leakage effect may be more pronounced though because of the greater difference between the internal and atmospheric pressures.