Tire monitor system question

Airstreamer67 wrote:
I got a piece of thin plastic pipe that fits over the rubber valve stem, cut it to size to allow the sending unit to screw fully on the valve stem, modified the bottom of the plastic pipe with a Drimel to fit the curve of my wheel, and placed it over the rubber valve stem. It keeps the PressurePro sender from flexing the stem, thus making it "act" like a steel valve stem.

This is a great idea.

We got some chrome valve stem covers that keep them from flexing - and they look pretty too.

Our 507's (non-flow thru) arrived last week and will install on our rig wheels before a trip to the Mid-West from Reno in early May.

Side note; friends of ours installed their 507 flow thru's on their wheels couple weeks ago and on startup they showed one tire with low pressure and leaking. Checked pressure manually and it confirmed. Swapped sensors after putting more air in and readings were fine. Turned out the original sensor was pinching the stem and causing the leak. Sensor was fine...operator error.

Nice before heading out to know what your tire pressures are...besides the monitoring on the road.

We have the TST-507 system. I had rubber valve stems on the truck wheels. We had a failure just west of Palm Springs due to the valve stem rubbing against the wheel. On our wheels the valve stem sits down in a recess.

In a bit of an irony, the system did alert that we had a slow leak, the leak was caused by the sensors flexing the valve stem.

Changed out to metal stems at the next stop over.

Love the system, wouldn't RV without one.

powderman426 wrote:
I guess it depends on your comfort level. I would put on the metal valve stems and use the 80% nitrogen mix.

For those that didn't catch it, air is 78.09% nitrogen. So, use metal valve stems and air. A difference of 1.91% nitrogen is irelivant.

EDIT. The difference in 78% and 100% nitrogen is questionable. The major difference is that 100% nitrogen is dry and air can contain variable amounts of humidity (water), which is another debatable topic. Race cars use 100% nitrogen because it eliminates a variable. Repeat performance is very important when a 500 mile race can be determined by a tenth of a second.

Hmm, that sounds like a pretty cool idea.

I got a piece of thin plastic pipe that fits over the rubber valve stem, cut it to size to allow the sending unit to screw fully on the valve stem, modified the bottom of the plastic pipe with a Drimel to fit the curve of my wheel, and placed it over the rubber valve stem. It keeps the PressurePro sender from flexing the stem, thus making it "act" like a steel valve stem.

Ron3rd wrote:

GMandJM wrote:
We've used our TST TPMS monitors on the rubber valve stems of our TT, our Exploder and our Honda Civic Hybrid. No problems.

The only trouble we had was at first when we used them on the metal valve stems of our MH. Go figure.

Keep a good eye on your rubber stems. I've got the TST 507 system and the rubber stems would flex so much the sensors hit the wheels as I noted in my post above. Check for these marks on your wheels. Some might use them forever with rubber stems but one of mine cracked and that was enough for me.

Thanks for the head up on that. I just went out and checked the tires on the truck. No marks. I'll check the Honda if/when we get back to Virginia. We interchange the same monitors between the truck, car and TT.

If the stem cracks, the TPMS monitor should let me know I'm losing air pressure.

GMandJM wrote:
We've used our TST TPMS monitors on the rubber valve stems of our TT, our Exploder and our Honda Civic Hybrid. No problems.

The only trouble we had was at first when we used them on the metal valve stems of our MH. Go figure.

Keep a good eye on your rubber stems. I've got the TST 507 system and the rubber stems would flex so much the sensors hit the wheels as I noted in my post above. Check for these marks on your wheels. Some might use them forever with rubber stems but one of mine cracked and that was enough for me.

DannyA wrote:
Looking at getting the TST system and know they recommend metal valve stems but wondering how many have not changed to metal stems and any problems using the ones that came on there.
It came with nitrogen in the tires and I hate to change that out if I don't have to.

I strongly recommend metal valve stems if you have the external sensors like TST or other brands. Yes, they will work with rubber stems, I ran them for almost a year after calling TST and hearing that they would work with rubber stems. What I found is the the sensors flop back and forth and hit the wheels leaving visible marks. I changed all of my stems over to steel after one of them failed eventually (cracked). The sensors will eventually crack the rubber stems IMO.

As to the nitrogen, my new Windjammer in my sig came with nitrogen (supposedly according to the sticker on the trailer) but that stuff is long gone. I guess it has some value, but I don't consider nitrogen an expense I want to incur.

We've used our TST TPMS monitors on the rubber valve stems of our TT, our Exploder and our Honda Civic Hybrid. No problems.

The only trouble we had was at first when we used them on the metal valve stems of our MH. Go figure.