Chasing Adventure

There are SO many opinions and pieces of advice when it comes to tires; weeding through them all was half the lesson! 

On Pearl, the tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS) is internal and the display comes up on the dash. For Maverick, it came with an internal TPMS on a separate display. This is important because improper tire pressure could lead to a blow-out or flat, and I have no desire to be stranded on the side of the road. 

At first, I couldn’t get the display to work properly. In knowing I’m basically getting a degree in camper ownership, I thought it might be user error (which has happened more times than I should probably admit). After hours of research online, I finally contacted Lippert and they quickly told be I had the wrong router (not my fault, whew) and they shipped me a new one for free. I was able to get all the tires synced up to the display, but couldn’t do anything else because we were not going anywhere for a few weeks. 

The manual says cold tire pressure should be 125 psi; however, it also said Maverick should weigh 16,800 lbs. and he is closer to 15,000 lbs. We had to take one more trip to the shop for Maverick to have the final approved warranty work done, and I was able to see how the psi fluctuated in the tires going the 35 miles up the road. It rose very quickly and the newbie in me thought something was wrong. 

So, I did more research and found out everyone has an opinion and their own way of handling tire pressure, with no way being the “right way”. It also didn’t help that, at the time, I had no idea what Maverick weighed. A few days later, we got on the road to head south. We found a CAT scale to get weighed and I was embarrassed at how new I acted getting that done. Thankfully, there were no other truckers waiting to use the scale.

Long story short, I learned so much in this one area the past month.

1. TPMS displays have ranges that the owner can set depending on the weigh of the rig. 

2. Always measure psi on cold tires and tires take about 3 hours to cool down from long drives. 

3. Get a proper weight of the rig to know the proper tire psi. 

4. Tire companies have a table on their website which shows the psi needed for each tire and weigh. 

5. The mechanics at Love’s Travel Centers are very nice and helpful if air is needed in the tires. 

With all this new knowledge, we leave for Tennessee in a few weeks and I look forward to a smooth ride with properly filled tires. One less thing to worry about!