I would agree with the TPMS being nice insurance and all that... if it didn't constantly throw false positives.

On my V6, it would always go off and random times. First day I had it, it went off and I called the dealership in a bit of a panic (long story, but they didn't tell me the car had it and I didn't know what it was).

I will say my GT has been far more "reliable", in this regard... but even still, I do check my tires once a week (thanks to the False Positives of the V6).

As far as the legal situation... you're going to have to prove that the tire was what caused the injury. I can't think of any instance where a slow-leak that the TPMS picked up on would degrade into an accident.

 

If there were a way to disable it permanently I'd do it!

Only thing their good for is letting those who don't bother to check their tire pressure know that the tires are improperly inflated.

**** NANNY state!I need TPMS like I need a whole in my head!

TPMS will not save you or warn you if you have a complete blowout.Even if it's a very large whole or the bead separated from the rim the tire would be down before you'd get any amount of warning from the TPMS.

 

My sentiments exactly. I've got multiple sets of wheels and tires for all four of our vehicles. If all of them had direct TPMS systems (only my Mustang does), I'd have $1000+ in extra sensors and relearning tools to buy to keep them all functioning. No thank you.

I've had three flat tires while driving in 24 years and around half a million miles, and TPMS wouldn't have helped me for any of them. At least let us have a switch to turn the light/system off, or allow indirect systems like my Mini Cooper has, which uses the ABS/speed sensors on each wheel, and doesn't require individual sensors. Of course Mini/BMW had to change to the individual wheel sensors in 2008 when the new law was passed.

 

When I replaced my stock bullitts for the c/s bullitts it took tpms nearly 100 miles to alert. Happened on the way to the dealer to teach the car about the new wheels. Far to many miles to be an effective warning of a puncture problem. TPMS may be effective to warn of long term neglect. But a rapid flat tire? I doubt it.

 

This is the thing though knk11, most catastrophic tire failures are the result of the tire bleeding pressure over time. The tire runs for sometime at very low pressures then overheats and disintegrates.

Your right that putting a large hole in the tire renders the TPMS system ineffective (just like putting a large hole in an oil pan renders an low pressure warning light ineffective) but relative to small punctures which leak over time or people who just plain dont check thier pressure its a much lower occurance (well outside of Detriot or various other places where the road surface is worse than your average bomb blasted Iraqi highway).

Tire beads failing or seperating from the rim are even lower, with the exception of some truck tire or specialized tire bead design (mainly for easy field replacement) and what seems to be an inane - no STUPID - practice by the ricer crowd of putting rims way to wide for the tires they run pulling the sidewalls out when the tire is inflated (wish I would have had a camera one day while I was at Best Buy, saw C4 Corvette rims on a Honda Civic with 205 or 215mm wide tires).



I wonder if the sensors were never calibrated correctly? I never had a problem with the sensors on my 07 or 09 cars, they both reported correctly when checked with a scan tool. Although I dont know whwere Ford set the threshhold for the system to illuminate?

Well there is a Ford dealership out on the West Coast paying 22 million as a result of a bad flat-repair, how you can determine a bad patch was installed from the mangled remains of a tire always perplexes me? Either tire forensics experts are really that good? Or lawyers are really good at swaying jury opinion (i'm inclined to think its the later).

Anyways, the tire failing and the TPMS system not picking it up isn't really the issue with a TPMS bomb. The real issue is if somebody either doesn't reinstall the sensors when they sell the car and the purchaser gets into an accident due to a tire related failure and an investigation reveals that the sensors aren't present or the owner has a tire failure, loses control of the vehicle and severely injures or kills one or several other motorist and again it is revealed the sensors weren't present to detect pressure loss.

And/Or the owner of the vehicle is permanently injured or worse. Luckily the owner has some recourse if they had a shop remove the sensors since it is implicitly stated that removing a functioning TPMS system is against federal law and the owner can be compensated by the shop (I'm sure alot of people are big on personal responsibility, but going from prince to pauper due to an accident will test most people's mettle) having been dumb enough to expose themselves to that level of liability.

 

Haha, didn't even finish reading the post, but being in Baghdad at the moment I feel bad for anyone who has to drive roads anywhere near these conditions in their Mustang.

 

Right. My tire shop said they couldn't install a new set of studded tires on my winter car unless I bought the TPMS.
But if I brought them just wheels (which I did) they can legally mount the tires on the wheels without TPMS.
Then I changed sets at home. And ignore the idiot light. And pay attention to the tire pressure - like I have for decades before the Firestone/Explorer lawsuits.
Heck I've always checked tire pressure regularly (usually monthly) because I'm cheap and want maximum mileage out of the tires.
Just looking at your tires walking up to the car goes a long way. And then the occasional walk around/kick.
I have hundreds of thousands of miles both commercial and private and have never had a blowout. And I don't remember a tire so flat I had to change on the side of the road since like 1980. I've noticed some are low (due to a nail), pumped them up, and carefully drove to the tire shop.

 

What about my 2007 V6 which was built in 2006 before the mandate went into effect?
It was only built 5 months after my 2006 GT.
It has TPMS, but legally Ford didn't have to put it on the car yet.

 

Changes are effective in model years, not when it was made.

 

What is that statement?
An inspired guess?
The law goes by a date:
TPMS required on every vehicle under 10,000 lbs GVWR starting September 1, 2007

 

Sorry I didn't take the time to wiki it. Just going by what I remember from buying my '07 GT500 built in Aug '06 w/ TPMS, and my '07 Mazda 3 that according to Mazda, said it was effective with the model year.