This was embarrassing. Never lie to a customer while the owner is standing nearby listening. Went to a shop I had been going to for about 20 years to get the tires changed over on the wife's car. It was a nice day, so I was standing outside by the bay they had just pulled the car into. While I was standing there, the owner walked up, and we started talking. My phone rang and it was the shop, so I put it on speakerphone so we both could hear. The voice on the other end said my TPM sensors were bad and needed to be replaced at $60 a pop. That's amazing, the tires are still in the back of the car I said to the owner. He said I'll take care of it and left with a very unhappy look on his face. Tire pressure monitors are easy to scam people on if you aren't knowledgeable of your vehicle's system. It is very common for some vehicles not to ID the sensor right off and may take a few miles before it does. And the scan tool won't reset them. Mine is one of those. So, as a result they try to scam you into a set of sensors you don't need.

 

The TPMS I use are my eyes and / or pressure gauge in my hand.

Too many electronic nannies on the new rigs to go wrong.

 

It's the wife's car and she gets all paranoid if the slightest thing happens. She expects it either to explode under neither her or the cops will come swooping and take her hostage for polluting the world.

 

Oh I get it. I got a frantic call from my girl just this week about some dash light warning alert coming on while she was driving.
She was so worked up about it that when she pulled into a parking lot to check things, she swiped a low post in the parking lot doing some solid body damage to the passenger side.

So we went from a low tire pressure light setting off a chick, so she is so worked up she drives into a yellow parking lot post.

Big help that warning message / light and noise was.

I'll stick with stuff from the 70--90's... and the occasional flat tire.

 

Being a former EMT, she is even afraid of airbags. Can't blame her on that though. Delayed deployment after an accident is more common than you would think. A number of injuries and even a few deaths have occurred from airbags.

 

I have been in a couple of rigs when the air bags go off. It can be really distracting when you are still trying to steer and keep things on the road with this big bag in your face.

The airbag packing dust that explodes everywhere is also not very tasty.

Must be the reason why the old Dodge '70s steering wheels where called Tuff Wheels

 

I have some doubts, should I ask those?

 

Doubt is just a question with extenuating circumstances based on insufficient and/or contradictory information. By all means ask. The best we can do is alleviate some of your doubts or at worst, add to them.

 

Wifey called me in December about two years ago,
(while I was still working, and we were swapping weekend to make a 3 hr drive to see each other)
she said a yellow “Butt light” appeared on the dashboard of her Toyota. 🤔🤣



I told her one of her tires was probably low due to the cold weather.

Crazy that my Pickup truck shows individual tire pressures, while her ‘Yota Highlander only says “a tire is low, you have to figure out which one, and how low.

 

Being an old guy, dipping the tires and kicking the oil is an ingrained response to owning a vehicle, or any other piece of equipment for that matter. All this technology just (in my opinion) makes people dumber and less responsible. Technology fails, it either doesn't work or it lies to you when it does. Dang it, now I'm on a rant.