Tyre sensor let me down - Sunday Mirror

I must admit I don't rate the TPM on the Octavia.

tpm is designed to tell you when the tyre is flat...not a few pounds under IIRC.

having said that the ones on my car tell me as soon as the difference is >3lbs

The problem is, that TPM doesn't control/check the actual pressure.

It is only a little help, to tell you when one or more wheeldiameter(s) differ from the initial wheeldiameters after resetting the system.

It only senses with the ABS sensors, not with pressure sensors in the wheels.

Therefor it is an aid for the driver, not a substitute for his responsibility.

Another problem is the knowledge of the carsalesmen nowadays They maybe know how to sell, but they don't know s*** of the way a car functions (besides driving it).

The problem is, that TPM doesn't control/check the actual pressure.

It is only a little help, to tell you when one or more wheeldiameter(s) differ from the initial wheeldiameters after resetting the system.

It only senses with the ABS sensors, not with pressure sensors in the wheels.

Therefor it is an aid for the driver, not a substitute for his responsibility.

Another problem is the knowledge of the carsalesmen nowadays They maybe know how to sell, but they don't know s*** of the way a car functions (besides driving it).

hey hey dont tar us all with the same brush, some of us are actually "human rubarb" like in our knowledge!

(but in all honesty i didnt know that as the only car ive ever seen with the tpm is my own demo:D but then ive never been asked about them!)

Sorry

Didn't want to tar you all with the same brush . Wrote it down a bit clumsy.

What I meant is, that a lot of people (no matter what profession) are trying to overshadow their own incompetence with a statement that isn't supported with knowledge .

(It isn't easy to write down what you mean in another language..... )

Personally I think it's a little iffy calling it a tyre pressure monitoring system. I think a 'flat tyre alert system' would be more appropriate as that seems to be the only time it does anything.

It's not a pressure transponder based system so it isn't physically monitoring the actual pressures at all.

That's why I didn't bother speccing it second time round.

There's no excuse for not checking the tyres manually at the correct times - the tyres are the only things keeping you on the road and rate as very important in my book.

I see the monitor as another warning tool in case you run over something sharp whilst driving and receive a slow(ish) puncture.

When i picked up my vRS the salesman didn't know what the button meant when I pointed to it (I already did through careful studying of the advertising manual).

I told him and his reply was that he "didn't think that it came on this model" before dashing into the back to check in a brochure.

Doesnt matter how many gadgets they add to the car you should still check the tyre pressure and no i dont rate it either as mentioned in a thread in the summer. i expect if the tyre blew out it would go off, but then you would know from the bang and the sudden loss of stability.

Mine alerted me when one of the rears lost 3psi. Took it in and found a nail in the tyre. Seems it doesnt have to go flat for it to alert you.

Mine alerts me at some strange times recently it has pinged up and said I have a fault but upon checking all pressures were ok.

I am putting it down to maybe some dirt or something, but will get mine checked when it has its 10k service.

There are no sensors to get dirty, it's all done via the ABS system.

It's hit and miss at best i'm afraid, thats why it's only an £80 option.

Interesting about the ABS detection on the TPM. This was one of the features I was hoping would work properly when I ordered it on my new Octavia. So many probs with the company Mondago (225/40-18), pressures dropping by up to 10psi a week on a some wheels some of the time and on others at other times for no good reason, over the course of 10 replacement tyres (cheesy wheels?).

The only course of action is to test it out on your own individual car/tyre combination, pressurising two tyres to 38psi and setting the system. Then gradually release the pressure a couple of pounds a time with a very short drive after each change. Whatever the pressure difference it takes to trigger the alert, add half this to the correct pressures for all your tyres then re-set the system and release the pressures to what they should be.

I would expect an ABS based TPM to respond best to tyres with more "give" in the sidewalls, ie. the 205/60-15 & 205/55-16 and to be less responsive with the 225's.

Sounds like porous alloys on the Ford if it wasn't the tyres.

Also, I don't know how many miles you need to drive before the TPM calibrates itself or realises there is a tyre problem, I have got quite a way down the road before the TPM bonged to say there was an issue with the freshly fitted tyres. Pressing and holding the TPM button will restart the calibration.

I think you are right about the different profile tyres though.

Low profile means little sidewall deflection and this is the only thing that can change the circumference of the tyre in a short time period.

One thing I forgot to say -

HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!!!

I have a Octavia Elegance 55 plate 140 bhp dsg, would i have this low tyre pressure thing ?.

There would be a button two spaces to the left of the ASR/ESP button, in the middle of the row of five buttons under the climatronic controls.

It would be optional on the Elegance so unless it was specced when it was ordered the answer will be no.

There would be a button two spaces to the left of the ASR/ESP button, in the middle of the row of five buttons under the climatronic controls.

It would be optional on the Elegance so unless it was specced when it was ordered the answer will be no.

the system seemed to work very well for me when i had a slow puncture in one of the factor spec dunlops( witch i wont be getting again only 16000 miles out of them) id inflate it to 30psi and it would always go off before it reached 15psi, but then again it went off the other day and there was no tyre difference, although i did have a third person with me in the car that could have unballanced it witch makes sence if its on the abs.

I've found TPM to be totally useless.

When I had a slow puncture recently, it failed to alert me.

Likewise, when I had a double blowout on the off side, it didn't make a sound.

It must be doing something though, as it complained almost immediately after having the two off side tyres replaced. A little bit late, me thinks.

Oh well, it came as standard, so I'm not too bothered. I'll stick to checking my pressures the old fashioned way.

Bagpuss.

Sorry

Didn't want to tar you all with the same brush . Wrote it down a bit clumsy.

What I meant is, that a lot of people (no matter what profession) are trying to overshadow their own incompetence with a statement that isn't supported with knowledge .

(It isn't easy to write down what you mean in another language..... )

lol i know what you mean

tpm is designed to tell you when the tyre is flat...not a few pounds under IIRC.

Waste of money then really. You can tell a tyre is flat just by looking at it.

I never paid the £50 or so for it, but I was always led to believe that the whole point of it was to keep pressures monitored. If it it waits until a tyre is flat, it hasn't done its job surely.

Sounds like you are lucky as they seem hit and miss.

I was under the impression it warns you when a tyre is going flat, eg greater than 3 or so PSI difference.

Does seem a bit of a cr*p system, but then it's only £50 on the options list.

At options list prices that means a switch and not much else.

The TPM feature has actually worked very well on my VRS - it warned me when I had lost about 2lbs pressure through a slow puncture (nail). The one annoyance is that it didn't tell me which tyre was low so I had to check them one by one.

Same with me STUARTB. Worked a treat when I had a nail in one of mine, a drop of only 3psi set it off.

The manual, at least the Greek edition that I have, is pretty clear: you should check the tyre pressure periodically since the system only detects single tyre problems. But then again it also says you should check oil level every time you refuel!

The TPM uses the ABS sensors and the steering wheel location sensor to calculate circumference differences when driving relatively straight. If both wheels in an axle loose similar amounts of pressure, as is often the case with normal pressure losses, there won't be any difference at all in circumference to detect.

It will however detect reliably when a single tyre looses significant pressure, due to a nail or something, and hopefully warn you to stop before you damage it beyond repair. My Mk I which I kept for 5 years got a tyre puncture twice, costing me a pair of tyres twice, that's 4 tyres, a lot more than the 50 quid optional TPM. If it saves you only one tyre I guess it was money well spent.