2013~2016: Not a fan of the TPMS monitor

[theblooms]

TPMS light never turned on, but I checked the air in my tire pressure anyway. Each was reading 27 pounds!

I know that the system looks for difference in rpm from wheel to wheel to trigger the system fault. I am absolutely not a fan of that. Makes it kind of useless. Oh well.

 

[ceric]

The old generation of TPMS measures the diameters of tires. (thru ABS/TCS sensors)
It can only check the differences among them.

The new generation has sensors inside the wheels.
It can detect absolute low PSI, in addition to differences in PSI.
That is the advantage of sensor-based TPMS.

 

[theblooms]

My CX-5 is a 2013, no sensors.
My wife's Mazda5 is a 2012, but has them.
Super strange.

 

[RL911]

The tpms system in the Mazda is pretty useless because YOU can’t monitor it. Most vehicles with tpms have a screen in the info system to tell you the pressure of each tire. By the time a tire reads low and you are alerted to it, it might be too late. As it is, you can’t monitor for a slow leak. As the weather changes, you also can’t see how your pressure changes without physically checking. I have a touring 2019, maybe this is a feature of the higher models? It’s one of the weakest points of the vehicle. Maybe it’s across all Mazda models?

 

[HyFlyer]

@theblooms , yep yours is ABS based sensing difference of pressure so if they all had 2psi the system would be happy. Also, let's say you have all your tires @ 35psi and park it in the driveway overnight. It has a slow leak on the right rear and goes completely flat by morning. It takes driving it a little while before the ABS system picks up on the difference so you might be 1/4 down the road before the warning come on. Simple, basic system.

@RL911 yeah, it'd be nice if tire pressure was displayed on the info-tainment display on the newer systems. The data is there and accurate too. Also senses temperature as well. It can be displayed in real time with an app such as FORScan. Incidentally, the newer system with the transmitters in the wheel also take 1/4mi or so of driving to update the current pressure. When you first fire the car up, it's reporting the psi/temp from when it was shut off until you drive it some.

 

[Bcdad182]

Mine has gone off twice in the almost 10 years of owing the vehicle. Once a tire pressure was a few pounds lower than the others but no leak found (weird) pumped it up and never had an issue with those tires again. Second time different set of tires, there was a nail puncture. Tire repaired and no issue since then. Haven’t had any issues with the current set of tires. I’m sorry your experience differs. It’s served me well and been accurate enough to prevent me from driving on a completely flat tire and that is it’s intended purpose.