farmerjg Posted June 13, 2016 Share Posted June 13, 2016 Hello everyone, I have a 2015 Fusion SE. My TPMS came on this morning; it was really hot yesterday and relatively cool this AM, I'm not worried about it. But as I was tinkering around with settings, am I just crazy or is there really not a readout in our cars to tell us what the actual tire pressure is? I couldn't find it anywhere in settings so I went ahead and ran a Sync report which also does not say the pressure, rather it just tells me the light came on. This is 2016, right? I probably can't fully imagine the amount of onboard health monitoring my car can do, but it seriously turns tire pressure into binary (flat or not, 0 or 1)? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Waldo Posted June 13, 2016 Share Posted June 13, 2016 There is no display of individual tire pressures in the 2015, but the new 2017 will have it. The problem is how would the system know if you rotated the tires? You would have to reprogram the system every time you rotated. Ford's lawyers decided there was too much risk that people would rotate, not reprogram, then incorrectly think a tire was fine when in fact it was a different tire that was setting off the warning. I'm not quite sure how the 2017 system works, but it might incorporate wheel speed to confirm which tire is low so that even if you rotate, it will tell you the correct tire that is low. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akirby Posted June 13, 2016 Share Posted June 13, 2016 And if the TPMS came on you are NOT fine at all. That doesn't happen until you're 25% low which can be 8 or 9 PSI. Your car should be at the recommended PSI when the tires are cold in the morning. I'd say you have a tire at least 8 lbs too low. Even with tpms you still need a good tire gauge. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
farmerjg Posted June 13, 2016 Author Share Posted June 13, 2016 Let me slightly rephrase "not worried about it." It went off, I got out and visually verified I didn't have a really flat tire (like 0 psi flat). I finished the drive to work, it still didn't look flat. So assuming it still looks ok before I drive home then I'll be able to get home where I can check pressures and add/adjust as necessary then plan accordingly for the AM to make it to my tire shop if need be. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
farmerjg Posted June 13, 2016 Author Share Posted June 13, 2016 Waldo, maybe I've mis-thought through tire pressure readouts. My Chevy's (and my old Chrysler and my parents Honda) display individual tire pressure, doesn't that mean each sensor actively reads the pressure? So what's the relevance of which location the sensor is? Are you saying the car only thinks one tire can be in one spot, so that if I have a flat on the front left, then I change that tire to the back left, then the car will still think the front left is the one that's actually flat? Or do different manufacturer's use different methodologies for TPMS' and Ford just philosophically disagrees with the way GM/Chrysler/Honda do there's? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akirby Posted June 13, 2016 Share Posted June 13, 2016 Yes that's it. I think Ford's initial system could not tell if you moved a tire and they were worried about giving an incorrect position that led to an accident. Apparently the new system can tell like the other mfrs. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Waldo Posted June 13, 2016 Share Posted June 13, 2016 Are you saying the car only thinks one tire can be in one spot, so that if I have a flat on the front left, then I change that tire to the back left, then the car will still think the front left is the one that's actually flat? That's exactly how the Ford system works. I don't know how the others deal with this, I think some of them just ignore it and tell you to reprogram any time you move it, I've seen some like Nissan that will display all 4 pressures, but they don't tell you which one is which and I think some systems (like Honda maybe) use multiple antennas so that they can tell which sensor is closer, and thus detect changes. If you have some of the OBD diagnostic tools, you can actually read the individual pressures in your Fusion's tires. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyross Posted June 13, 2016 Share Posted June 13, 2016 Let me slightly rephrase "not worried about it." It went off, I got out and visually verified I didn't have a really flat tire (like 0 psi flat). I finished the drive to work, it still didn't look flat. So assuming it still looks ok before I drive home then I'll be able to get home where I can check pressures and add/adjust as necessary then plan accordingly for the AM to make it to my tire shop if need be. Just because a tire LOOKS OK doesn't mean it is. Today's low-profile tires don't look obviously low until they are EXTREMELY low. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
farmerjg Posted June 15, 2016 Author Share Posted June 15, 2016 Just because a tire LOOKS OK doesn't mean it is. Today's low-profile tires don't look obviously low until they are EXTREMELY low. Agreed....but what's your solution? If your TPMS goes off but you literally can't tell which tire is flat do you flatbed the thing back to a tire shop? Take a shot in the dark and put the donut on one of the four and hope you get lucky? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akirby Posted June 15, 2016 Share Posted June 15, 2016 Agreed....but what's your solution? If your TPMS goes off but you literally can't tell which tire is flat do you flatbed the thing back to a tire shop? Take a shot in the dark and put the donut on one of the four and hope you get lucky? I'll take C, Alex: pull out the tire gauge and check them. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
propwash Posted June 15, 2016 Share Posted June 15, 2016 I agree. All the light is telling you is that at least one of your tires is low. If you keep an accurate gauge in the glove box, it's a three minute job to check the pressure on all four tires, and you'll know for sure which tire(s) could be causing the light to come on. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyross Posted June 15, 2016 Share Posted June 15, 2016 Even a super-cheap 'pencil' gauge is better than nothing. Even if it's not super-accurate on it's own, it should make it obvious which tire is way off the others. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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