A bulge in a sidewall is a small thing to look at and a serious thing to find. It means the cords inside that part of the casing have snapped, usually from a pothole or a kerb, and the only thing still holding the shape is a thin skin of rubber under pressure. In daylight you would spot it walking past. At eleven at night on an unlit street you will not, because the light is coming from above and a bulge sits in its own shadow.
So the first thing out of the van after dark is the lamp, and the first thing we do with it is run it flat along the sidewall rather than straight at it. Held low and to the side, the light rakes across the surface and a bulge throws a shadow you cannot miss. We do the same on the inner face, which nobody ever sees, by turning the wheels onto full lock. It takes a minute, and it is the difference between changing the tyre you called about and finding the one that was going to strand you next week. We work through the night across UB8 every day of the year.
Cold nights take pressure out of every tyre on the car, and one of them is usually already leaking. We are out on those mornings from before it is light, across UB8, checking whether it is a genuine puncture, a perished valve or simply four tyres that have all lost a few psi. A Hillingdon cul-de-sac or a the Brunel University area main road, tell us which. A tight terrace in the Brunel University area or a narrow bay on Western Avenue is usually workable.
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The streets around Cowley and Hillingdon Heath go quiet and fairly dark after midnight, and a lot of tyre damage in this part of town comes from parking rather than driving: a wheel squeezed against a kerb in a tight bay, over and over, until something inside lets go. None of it announces itself. When the lamp is already out for one tyre it costs nothing to look properly at the other three, inner faces included, and that is usually where the surprise is.
A driver near Uxbridge Moor called about a soft rear at midnight. The rear was an ordinary puncture. The lamp then found a bulge on a front tyre that nobody had noticed, and that was the one worth worrying about.
A car parked around Brunel University had taken a pothole on the way in that evening. We came out after eleven, lit the sidewall properly and replaced the damaged tyre where it stood.
Tight parking near the High Street and a badly lit bay had put a wheel hard against a kerb. The scuff on the rim was cosmetic. The bulge a couple of inches from it was not.
Yes. The cords in that area have already failed and the rubber left is holding pressure on its own. It does not heal, it does not become safer at lower speed, and it usually goes without further warning. A tyre with a bulge wants changing rather than watching.
We carry our own lighting and set it up before anything else happens. Most of what we check relies on raking light across a surface rather than flooding it, which is often clearer at night than in flat daylight.
No. Nights, weekends and bank holidays are ordinary working hours here rather than an exception, so the same job stays the same job. You pay by card at the kerb whenever we finish.
Typically 30 to 60 minutes across UB8 and UB10. Stay in the car with the doors locked if you would rather, tell us exactly where you have parked, and we will ring as we turn into the road rather than leaving you watching for headlights.
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