History
Due to the significant influence tire pressure has on vehicle safety and efficiency, TPMS was first adopted widely by the European market as an optional feature for luxury passenger vehicles in the 1980s. The first passenger vehicle to adopt tire-pressure monitoring (TPM) was the Porsche 959 in 1986, using a hollow spoke wheel system developed by PSK. In 1996 Renault used the Michelin PAX system for the Scenic and in 1999 the PSA Peugeot Citroën decided to adopt TPM as a standard feature on the Peugeot 607. The following year (2000), Renault launched the Laguna II, the first high volume mid-size passenger vehicle in the world to be equipped with TPM as a standard feature.
In the United States, the Firestone recall in the late 1990s (which was linked to more than 100 deaths from rollovers following tire tread-separation), pushed the Clinton administration to legislate the TREAD Act. The Act mandated the use of a suitable TPMS technology in all light motor vehicles (under 10,000 pounds), to help alert drivers of severe under-inflation events. This act affects all light motor vehicles sold after September 1, 2007. Phase-in started in October 2005 at 20%, and reached 100% for models produced after September 2007. In the United States, as of 2008 and the European Union, as of November 1, 2012, all new passenger car models (M1) released must be equipped with a TPMS. From November 1, 2014, all new passenger cars sold in the European Union must be equipped with TPMS. For N1 vehicles, TPMS are not mandatory, but if a TPMS is fitted, it must comply with the regulation.
After the Tread Act was passed, many companies responded to the new market opportunity by releasing TPMS products that use an obvious means of getting tire pressure and temperature data across a vehicle's rotating wheel-chassis boundary — battery-powered radio transmitter wheel modules.
The introduction of run-flat tires and emergency spare tires by several tire and vehicle manufacturers has motivated to make at least some basic TPMS mandatory when using run flat tires. With run flat tires, the driver will most likely not notice that a tire is running flat, hence the so-called "run flat warning systems" were introduced. These are most often first generation, purely roll-radius based iTPMS, which ensure that run-flat tires are not used beyond their limitations, usually 80 km/h and 80 km driving distance.
The iTPMS market has progressed as well. Indirect TPMS are able to detect under-inflation through combined use of roll radius and spectrum analysis and hence four-wheel monitoring has become feasible. With this breakthrough, meeting the legal requirements is possible also with iTPMS.
Read more about this topic: Tire-pressure Monitoring System
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