I live in Minnesota – hot in the Summer, cold in the Winter. Those temperature swings mean that most people are checking and topping off their vehicle tires a couple of times a year. I also have a wife and three kids who all drive their own cars. We’ve got Winter wheels and Summer wheels, we’ve got trailers and ATV’s and a few footballs and basketballs laying around as well.
In short, I’ve got a lot of things that need filling with air, and fairly often. I do own a full-sized air compressor with a 50-foot hose, but even so, it’s not always convenient to use as the tank takes time to fill and it’s not a lot of fun to wait for, especially when it’s cold outside. So, when I saw the Ryobi One+ Power Inflator on sale at a local home store, I decided to give it a try. I already own multiple Ryobi One+ power tools, so this one seemed like a perfect addition to the collection.
What You Get
The version I bought was the tool only – no battery or charger. That didn’t matter to me as I already own a dozen or so batteries and multiple chargers for them. I happened to get it on sale for $24.99, which felt like a great bargain and well worth taking a chance on, regardless of how well it worked. Amazon also sells them with a battery for a decent price. The Ryobi One+ P737D Power Inflator comes with a 20” non-detachable hose that has the typical fitting for attaching to valve stems.
It also comes with a couple of plastic adaptors and a metal needle adaptor for filling footballs or other non-tire items. The adaptors fit in a little compartment on the front of the inflator, so you don’t lose them. The inflator also has a digital pressure gauge on the back so you can keep track of the pressure as you fill whatever item you have that needs air added.
How It Works
In a word – great! It’s as simple to use as any cordless drill. Attach a Ryobi One+ battery (I used a 3-amp hour battery for my testing) connect the fitting to a tire stem, squeeze the trigger and fill whatever you need to fill with air. You need to squeeze the trigger to activate the pressure gauge and when you release it the trigger, the gauge will show the current pressure reading for the tire, etc. I compared the digital pressure gauge read out to 2 different analog gauges I own and found it to be consistently accurate with both of them. After that, I went around and topped off 16 tires on the 4 cars at my house at that time.
The most I had to add to any tire was about 5 pounds of pressure and it took maybe 10 seconds or so to take a tire from 30 to 35 psi. I didn’t test how long it would take to fill a completely flat tire, but it seemed to fill tires just as quickly as using my full-sized compressor and was far more portable. I also didn’t have to wait for an air tank to fill up first, so it’s super convenient to use. One thing I wanted to specifically test was how well the pressure gauge would work for things like low pressure ATV tires. Those are always a challenge to fill correctly, because an old school analog gauge doesn’t work well at registering the pressure from a low-pressure tire like those on an ATV.
I don’t have an ATV at home, it’s at the cabin, so I deflated a basketball and added a little air to see if the gauge on the inflator would register really low pressures. To my delight, it did. It registered at 3.5 psi on the mostly deflated basketball, which is great, as that means I can accurately fill my ATV tires to the 4-8 psi recommended pressure.
What Would I Change
Not much? The inflator worked great on everything I tested it on. After topping off 16 tires, a football and a basketball, the battery still registered as full, so you’re not going to run out of juice even if you have to fill several completely flat tires. It’s a little loud, but not nearly as loud as a full-sized compressor. Certainly not enough to be annoying for the short time needed to top off most items you’d be using it on. The pressure gauge works great, and I should mention that it is lighted as well, in case you’re outside in the dark.
It might be nice if you could set it to automatically fill to a certain pressure and then lock the trigger and have it stop automatically when it hit the right pressure, but that’s a pretty minor thing. They might sell a fancier version that has that feature, but I don’t really need it, and for the bargain price I paid this inflator is fantastic. If you need portable air and you already have Ryobi One+ tools, I highly recommend this inflator.
Even if you already have a compressor, the convenience of instant air from the Ryobi One+ P737D Power Inflator makes it well worth purchasing!
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