Perhaps you’ve heard the great debate about tire pressure and how that alone could help Americans save hundreds of millions of gallons of fuel? In fact, it became part of the presidential campaign in 2008 when Senator Obama told Americans that if they wanted to save fuel, the first thing to do is keep their tires fully inflated. As fun as it may sound, it has a good point, it is the easiest and simplest thing you can do to save fuel.

So, you ask, how far along has tire pressure monitoring advanced recently? Well, you are making significant progress in the transportation industries for a variety of reasons; reduce fuel costs, safety and insurance savings, regulations stemming from the Firestone affair several years ago regarding Ford Explorer rollover accidents. Now, in the SUV market, we see that it has made significant progress in the operation manuals of all vehicles, mainly thanks to lobbying from consumer groups.

The DOT has also examined these issues for passenger cars, and the tire industry has had mixed emotions for a number of reasons, such as the need to decrease lawsuits and restore confidence in automotive safety regulations. The DOT has often stated that the best thing to do is educate consumers about tire pressure. Perhaps Obama’s comments could be an extension of all these issues?

Is simply filling the tires going to solve the gasoline crisis?

No, but it is a start to improving car safety and will actually save fuel for those who find they are wasting many gallons of gas each week on under-inflated tires. On average, because all 4 tires have 12 pounds of pressure under inflated; maybe 6 at a time, 4 at another, and 2 at another. Every tire that is not inflated increases the chance of an accident and is a lot like flushing money down the toilet. Think about this.