tire pressure monitor systems

[CAP1]

yep......i can't wait till every single car i work on has these frackin stupid assd things.

 get a fast moving high or low pressure system come through? it triggers them. go from 40 degrees one day to the teens the next day? it triggers them,. i get people all day long stopping in to ask me to check their tires for air, although they look fine....and when i check them they are. why did they want them checked? because the light on their dash told em they were low. too frackin stupid to use their common sense.
 most of these systems function by a valve stem with a transponder built into them, thus making the valve stem expensive(as in $50-150). plus now you need to be careful when you change the tires, so as to not break that transponder.
 some of them need to be programed to the car. some cars have a simple reset procedure, and others you need to go through the computer.

 the most fun thing, is that the govt. has mandated that all new cars must be equipped with some form of tire pressure monitor now. WHY? are we all REALLY too friggin stupid to look at our car, and say "hey, that tire is flat!"?


<<rant off>>


 oh yea.....try the ava....free jets all week. 

[1701E]

Would be nice to have them installed, but there should be a light next to it reading "Use common sense dummy, check the tire visually".  I could have used one last month when I left a parking lot noticing something odd (old car, seemed mostly normal), after about 1/4 mile I found it was a flat (second flat from that blasted lot).  Would have been nice to know before I drove it was flat but I never remember to check each tire before driving.  Stupid flat cost me $90 to fix due to having ripped the entire thing up driving on it.
I do feel bad for so many Auto-mechanics, I've seen some stupid people come into the local place here while I've waited.



You're becoming a walking billboard!

[Dichotomy]

Ummm

Perhaps I'm spoiled but when my car starts pulling un naturally one direction or another my first thought is 'I've got a tire problem' and I stop as soon as I can, pull out a tire gauge, and check them if there is nothing definitive from a visual inspection. 

98 cent tire gauge vs 150 dollar tire for the win. 

[guncrasher]

My tire pressure light has beeen on for years.   Been replaced at the dealer 3 times.I just gave up.  I tell my daughter, she hates putting on her seat belt, that its the seat belt sensor light.


Semp

[mcboi]

Yea Cap1 i see the same thing everyday at work as well. It really gets annoying when your balls deep in some "real" work and these clowns pull up like "can you check my air pressure my light is on" that really wears me out. And the kicker is they want it checked NOW because they've got other things to do rather than wait for you to check it. It doesnt matter to them if your juggling 4 things in 1 hand trying to: oh lets say put a steering knuckle back in they want you to stop what your doing now and check it. It normally doesnt bother me that bad when the elderly come and ask me to do it because i can tell something that is easy for me to do (im 25yrs old) is really difficult for them to do. And even women i dont mind doing it for hell half of them barely know how to put gas in their cars, but what really wears me out is when men my age come by and demand we check. There's been a time or too when i a men come and are like "Hey!....... Hey!..... HEY!!!! Can you tell me why my tire pressure light is on?" Im like sure you probably need some air in your tire, there is a gas station right down the street that has free air! 

[Dichotomy]

wait

you can get free air?  Where?

I tried blowing my tires up manually once and it floated away

All comedy aside, low grade as it may be, I've got a ton of respect for mechanics.  I could probably do 50% of the 'easy' work you guys do after screwing it up 10 times. Another reason I dig this board.  You can get really solid straightforward advice you can count on from people who know what they're doing and explained in a language I can understand. 

I contribute.. hmmm... well... I can make funny pictures and stuff But if you need a light pole designed I'm all over it!!!

[Beefcake]

Great, more expensive crap that will break down. Like Dichotomy said, I keep a little tire gauge in my truck and check the tires if it seems like one side is pulling to much.

[CAP1]

ASIDE  from my rant, when i see advice asked for here, i try to offer the best advice i can, because when it comes right down to it, there are a LOT of shops out there that will try to rake ya over the coals every time. i don't do that...which is why i'll probably always be poor....but at least i can sleep at night.
 i worked for a shop(midas) that was top of the line on selling things that cars didn't need. i stayed there only long enough to get another job, then i was outta there.

 yea mcboi.......old people, i never hesitate on doing little things like that for them. i'm too close to being one of em(48).    women i do it for too, but i make it a point to educate them as i do it. i explain how much air should be there, and show them how to read the gauge. and of course, show them how to put the air in.

 and yes, it is somewhat annoying when i see a healthy young to middle aged male come up, and want/need help with air, when my overweight diabetic mother doesn't need as much help as some of these guys.

 and yea shirly....some places still have free air, although those places are becoming fewer and farther between.

[CAP1]

Great, more expensive crap that will break down. Like Dichotomy said, I keep a little tire gauge in my truck and check the tires if it seems like one side is pulling to much.

well here;s the funny part about that.

 ford was one of the first to use those half assed transponders. meanwhile, gm was piggybacking this system on the abs system. it worked very well. lower tire pressure will create a different speed of rotation on one of the tires, and trigger the light. less false alarms on these too.
 for whatever reason(i'm sure an engineer showed how these transponders were necessary and that the other way sucked) gm went to the same type of system. meanwhile, for a little while, ford went to an earlier gm system that used to be used on the 80's corvettes......use a gigantic clamp around the wheel, and clamp the transponder to the middle of the wheel. very easy to frack that one up too when changing the tires.

 
 should i go into the half dozen people a day that want me to drop what i'm doing and walk out in the pouring rain to give them directions, or shoudl i start another whining thread about that one? 

[mcboi]

Yessir i always try to educate the ones that have no idea like when some woman pulls up in a Honda civic and is like can you put 50psi in my tires. I try to explain to them not to go off of what the tire says but rather to go off of what the label inside the door is
over half the drivers ive dealt with never even knew that there was such a thing as that label indicating the proper psi for their vehicle.

and i totally agree with you on being honest and sometimes costing you. i almost got fired for explaining to a guy that his ball joints on his 98 Dodge Ram were in need of replacing and advising him to take it easy on the truck until he got the $ to get them replaced, but the manager inside was wearing this guy out about how they would fall out the next day if he didnt do the $900 job now. If it is dire that it needs to be done then i let them know, but if it is something that they can hold out a little on, im going to let them know that as well.

My pops hates mechanics has never taking his car to a mechanic because he doesn't trust them, so he learned to do all of his own basic repair work himself. I guess because of my pops i try to be as honest as i can with the customers as i can so that they will trust me and when i say something is in need of replacing they understand and do it.

To me it all comes down to loyal customers, you have 2 kinds of cattle in our industry daily cattle that you can milk over and over ( meaning you treat them right and they continue coming back) and there are slaughter cattle that you try to "rape" and get as much as you can at 1 time. me personally i prefer the dairy cattle lol job security

[1701E]

Ummm

Perhaps I'm spoiled but when my car starts pulling un naturally one direction or another my first thought is 'I've got a tire problem' and I stop as soon as I can, pull out a tire gauge, and check them if there is nothing definitive from a visual inspection. 

98 cent tire gauge vs 150 dollar tire for the win. 

You must have a nice car.
Every flat I've had drove like normal it just made a strange noise. Considering this old Honda makes weird noises anyways it's hard to take them seriously.

[Dichotomy]

and yet neither of you guys are local  

I've got a 2000 stang v6 that could use some of the standard maint for having 100k on it.  Caps already given me the tutorial and I'm sure I can do it but how nice it would be to be able to take it to a guy I trust that will be reasonable on his rates.  I want to give it to the Squid soon then I'm going to be looking for a 2001 to 2003 GT.  It'd be dang nice to take it to a shop I trust to give me the low down.

By the way Cap.. the work you told me how to do? Ya that 'trustworthy shop' down the street estimated $1500 bucks. *eyeroll*

[Dichotomy]

You must have a nice car.
Every flat I've had drove like normal it just made a strange noise. Considering this old Honda makes weird noises anyways it's hard to take them seriously.

perhaps because I've been driving it almost 11 years?  no that's not it.  I'm just very sensitive to how my car drives and 'feels' .  Always have been from a 77 Cutlass to an F350 to my beloved stang.  *shrug*

[Meatwad]

Anyway to go around or disable the tire things? How about putting in a cheap valve stem?

[CAP1]

Anyway to go around or disable the tire things? How about putting in a cheap valve stem?

you can put the regular stems in their place.....but then you've got to live with that light lit on the dash.