Is dog urine responsible for a flat tire?

Dogs have an annoying action. They like to lift their legs and pee on the wheels. Many car owners will be angry when they see urine marks on the wheels, because everyone is spreading that dog urine will corrode the tires, so that the car is prone to the risk of a tire blowout when driving on the highway. Should a dog take responsibility for a flat tire?

Let’s first look at the composition of tires. The main material for making tires is rubber. Rubber is an elastic polymer with the advantages of high strength, elasticity, good wear resistance, and strong anti-aging properties. Someone has done an experiment, in an environment of 23 degrees Celsius, the sealing rubber was soaked in 30% ammonia water for 28 days.

Taking out the sealing rubber and measuring its elongation at break, the maximum drop was only 18%. Elongation is an index used to measure the toughness of materials. The index of sealing rubber reaches 400%. Even if it drops by 18%, the index remains above 300%.

After being immersed in 3% sulfuric acid at 70°C for 28 days, the elongation of the sealing rubber only decreased by 17% at the highest. In summary, slight acid and alkali will not cause greater corrosion to the tire.

Let’s take a look at the composition of dog urine. Most of the dog urine is water, and the rest contains a small amount of uric acid and urea. The food that dogs eat every day basically contains acid and alkali components. Dogs who like to eat meat generally have acidic urine.

If a dog likes to be vegetarian, its urine will be alkaline, with a pH between 5.4 and 8.4. Calculated in this way, 30% ammonia water is hundreds of times higher than the alkaline components in dog urine, and the hydrogen ion concentration in 3% sulfuric acid is 150,000 times higher than the hydrogen ion concentration in dog urine. In this way, the composition of dog urine has little effect on tire corrosion.

In addition to the low acidity and alkalinity of dog urine, the residence time on the tires will not be too long, and it will quickly evaporate in the air.

Tires are particularly resistant to corrosion, but they also have their own weaknesses. Some energetic rays, such as ultraviolet rays, are the main factors that cause tire aging. The main cause of tire bursts on highways is mostly under-pressure of the tires or excessive wear of the tires.

Although dog urine is not a threat to a car puncture, pet owners should pay more attention when walking their dogs. While cherishing their pets, they must also pay attention to protecting other people’s cars to make the relationship between people more harmonious.

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