Cooper Tire & Rubber Co.’s Tread Wisely program is emphasizing three tire safety tips for young drivers and offering a chance to win a $3,000 scholarship for participating in a tire safety campaign.
Tread Wisely is a program developed by Cooper to encourage tire and vehicle safety among teens and young adults.
3 Tire Safety Tips
- Check tire pressure: To check tire pressure, find your car’s ideal pressure listed on the sticker inside the car door, glove box or fuel door, or in the car’s manual. Remove the tire’s valve cap and press a tire gauge firmly onto the valve stem. The end of the tire pressure gauge will pop up and show a reading of the pounds per square inch (PSI) of air pressure in your tires. If this number matches your recommended tire pressure, you’re good to go. If the number is lower than the recommended tire pressure, the tire is underinflated. If the reading on the gauge is higher than the pressure recommended for your car, you need to release some air.
- Check tread depth: To check your tread depth, use the penny test. Insert the edge of a penny into the most worn groove of your tire tread with Lincoln’s head down and facing you. If the top of Honest Abe’s head is covered by tread, meaning you cannot see the top of his head, the tire tread is in good shape. If the top of his head is visible, you need to replace the tire.
- Assess the overall condition of the tires: Assess the overall condition of the tires by looking at them closely to ensure there are no cuts, cracks, punctures or bulges. If you spot any of these, get your tires checked by a professional before driving on them.
Tire Safety Campaign Scholarship
Students can learn how to perform these checks by taking part in the Pump It Up campaign offered by Tread Wisely and DoSomething,org.
Pump It Up encourages young drivers to print and place eye-catching tire safety flyers under their friends’ windshield wipers. Those who receive the flyers text the word “TIRE” to 38383 for fun and informative messages about how to check their tire pressure, tread depth and overall tire condition. The young drivers also receive text messages encouraging them to join the campaign and share tire safety with their friends and family.
Those who sign up and successfully complete the campaign, which will run through Sept. 30, will be entered into a drawing to win a $3,000 scholarship.
Brief videos showing how to perform these three important tire safety checks can also be found on the Tread Wisely mobile app. The app is free and available for download from the App Store (iOS) or Google Play Store (Android).
To learn more about Tread Wisely or the Pump It Up campaign, visit www.treadwisely.org.
About Tread Wisely
Tread Wisely is a tire and vehicle safety program for young drivers sponsored by Cooper and designed to educate and motivate young people to take necessary precautions and important safety measures when it comes to their tires and driving. Cooper shares life-saving messages about tire safety through Tread Wisely social media channels, the web, special youth-directed safety events, and on the ground in communities across the United States. Hundreds of Cooper employees have signed up to serve year-round as Tread Wisely volunteers, demonstrating tire safety in schools, at sporting events, churches and other venues, reaching young drivers in the communities where they live and work. To learn more, visit www.treadwisely.org or follow @TreadWisely1 on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook.
About Cooper
Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. is the parent company of a global family of companies that specializes in the design, manufacture, marketing and sale of passenger car, light truck, medium truck, motorcycle and racing tires. Cooper's headquarters is in Findlay, Ohio, with manufacturing, sales, distribution, technical and design operations within its family of companies located in more than one dozen countries around the world. For more information, visit www.coopertire.com, www.facebook.com/coopertire or www.twitter.com/coopertire.
