My husband, two-year old daughter and I were recently holidaying in the Gold Coast. We decided to drive from the lovely suburb of Benowa (where we were staying) to Byron Bay. It was only a short drive but with a two year old it felt like a lot longer!
Prior to commencing our holiday, my husband had purchased (yet another) gadget for our four wheel drive. This time it was a Tyre Pressure Monitoring System. I was always a firm believer that you could tell if a tyre was flat by looking at it but I quickly learned that there was a lot more to it than that. I didn’t know a great deal about blow-outs but I knew it was the last thing I wanted with a cranky and car-seat bound two-year old.
On our way to Byron, we stopped along the way at the beautiful “Mullumbimby Chocolate Shop” where we stocked up on mandatory supplies before hitting the road again. When we got back in the car, one of the sensors was alerting us to an issue with one of the rear tyres.
Some interesting information that I learned during this process is that blowouts are most commonly caused by driving long distances on “over stressed” tyres. Over stress can be caused by overloading, excessive speed or under inflated tyres. Given that I had (almost) packed our entire house for this trip was probably an indication of why the tyres were “over stressed”. Excessive and continuous change of the tyres sidewalls will cause an increase in temperature. This temperature increase can then cause disastrous tyre failure known as a “blowout”. Since the TPMS can alert the driver to not only low tyre pressure, which is the primary cause of blowouts, but also to excessive heat which can be caused by overloading or excessive speed for long periods of time, this tyre sensor can significantly reduce the possibly of blowouts occurring by alerting the driver to these dangerous factors. In the end we rectified the issue and were able to solve it before it turned into a disaster with us waiting on the side of the road for hours before help arrived.
My husband buys a lot of gadgets for our car but this is one that I truly see the value in. I would highly recommend a TPMS whether you are driving 5km or 500km. It gave me peace of mind that the safety of my family and car were not compromised.