When people are under too much pressure, it wears them down. Stress eats away at the joys of life, causing mental health to deteriorate and tempers to snap. There’s a reason why intense professions and workplaces lead to high rates of depression, anxiety, and associated ills.
But with tyres, it’s the opposite – too little pressure is what causes tyre wear. Under-inflated tyres drag against the road, scraping off rubber and causing them to go bald like they’re having a mid-life crisis. Worn tyres are a safety hazard, with poorer traction that reduces handling and increasing stopping distance.
That’s not to say that there’s no upper limit on the pressure that a tyre can take. If your tyres are overinflated, in contrast, they’ll be ready to pop when they receive a shock. Just like with balloons, as anyone who has ever organised a child’s birthday party knows, if you blow it up too much, then it’s going to burst.
So how do you keep your tyre pressure exactly within the right range? Well, the trick is monitoring it, and you have two options. You can do it manually, which is time-consuming and you’re likely to forget about it, or you can get a tyre pressure monitoring system.
The TPMS measures the pneumatic inside your tyres, and alerts you when that pressure is too high or too low. Thanks to state-of-the-art tyre sensors, you’ll always be up-to-date with the pressure level, even if you never find time to get down there and check the pressure yourself. Once you know that the pressure is above or below the optimum, you can take action, pumping tyres up or letting air out as is appropriate. That way, you’ll reduce tyre wear and decrease the risk of blowouts, keeping your tyres healthy and taking some pressure off you.