10 years ago I bought a Viair 440P to keep in my Jeep. It is a portable unit that attaches to the battery leads and is stored in the Jeep "trunk" when not in use. While primarily used to reinflate my 33 inch tires after airing down, it certainly makes life easier for anything that needs to be inflated and has served me well with no issues until last week.
While checking the tire pressure on one of my vehicles, I could not get the tire chuck on the end of the air hose to properly seal on the valve stem. I was able to finally get air in the tire, but had to hold the hose in place to seal it. Shortly after that I sent an email to Viair customer service about the issue. They responded within a day diagnosing the problem being the rubber grommet in the tire chuck. They asked for my mailing address and said the would send me a replacement, which showed up a few days later.
The replacement of the grommet was pretty straight forward simply requiring the removal of the retaining pin on the chuck lever to access the grommet. A dental tool pulled the old one right out land the new one slipped right in. Reassemble the chuck and reinstall the lever and pin and it was good as new.
Comparing the old grommet and new one side by side and the problem was obvious. Not only was the old grommet worn with the walls being significantly thinner, but there was also quite a bit of dry rot. This was an easy an inexpensive (free in this case) fix to a problem to which I hadn't given much thought. I'm just glad I found it before I was in a situation that I was depending on my air compressor.
While checking the tire pressure on one of my vehicles, I could not get the tire chuck on the end of the air hose to properly seal on the valve stem. I was able to finally get air in the tire, but had to hold the hose in place to seal it. Shortly after that I sent an email to Viair customer service about the issue. They responded within a day diagnosing the problem being the rubber grommet in the tire chuck. They asked for my mailing address and said the would send me a replacement, which showed up a few days later.
The replacement of the grommet was pretty straight forward simply requiring the removal of the retaining pin on the chuck lever to access the grommet. A dental tool pulled the old one right out land the new one slipped right in. Reassemble the chuck and reinstall the lever and pin and it was good as new.
Comparing the old grommet and new one side by side and the problem was obvious. Not only was the old grommet worn with the walls being significantly thinner, but there was also quite a bit of dry rot. This was an easy an inexpensive (free in this case) fix to a problem to which I hadn't given much thought. I'm just glad I found it before I was in a situation that I was depending on my air compressor.
