For those of you who have toyed with the idea of having a set of winter tires and rims, please be aware that as of 2008 Smart cars have sensors to warn of tires with low pressure and if you don't buy an extra set, your warning light will be glowing all the time.
So, I special ordered a set of the expensive sensors....(almost $100 each, but I figured they would last a long time and I figured more tires probably lose air in the winter than summer, and since we don't have spare tires nor any room to keep one, I figured it was cheap insurance.)
Well, today my sensors came, but unfortunately, I was not informed that price only included the sensor and not the special mounting nut or mounting nut with O-ring that is needed to anchor the metal tire stem properly. Yep, you guessed it, those are not cheap, either....almost $7.00 each.
So, just be fore-warned that when you decide you want that extra set of wheels, there may be more issues involved and far more expenses than just four winter tires. I just hope this is my last surprise. By the way, the sensors are made by Schrader...(I had been trying to find that information out, earlier...)
I'm sure if this saves me the cost of a high speed blow-out I'll not miss this additional money...but next time I decide to make a "simple' modification, I think I'll find somebody else who has done it first and see what all was involved.
For those of you who have toyed with the idea of having a set of winter tires and rims, please be aware that as of 2008 Smart cars have sensors to warn of tires with low pressure and if you don't buy an extra set, your warning light will be glowing all the time.
are you sure about that? i currently own 2 cars (audi) with the sensors and have owned several others (BMW, Nissan) with the sensors. i've changed the wheels on all but the new one that i got last week. i've never had the light stay on. it just shuts the feature off. maybe it's different on the Smart.
I'm only reporting what I've been told by Canadians that already have their car. In fact, one gentleman thought he wasn't going to have to worry about it as his light did not go off on his way home from having his tires changed. However, once he took his stock tires and wheels out of his car and left them in his garage, the warning light was glowing.
I just wanted to give others a heads-up so they didn't go down the same piece by piece path that I did without knowing ahead of time.
evidentally the Smart must directly monitor the pressure, where some others (like on the MINI), apparently monitor "out of roundness"...so to speak, and not pressure directly. I don't know how nissan does it, if I remember in a test driving the Z, it did read out pressure as well.
My Jeep (Diamler/Chrysler) has the unit mounted in the air valve filler tube and it measure presure inside the tire, I would assume that the smart is the same as they were developed by the same people. You can replace the valve stem but your light will allways stay on unless you disable it.
For we sticklers who always check tire pressures on a regular basis, I can see where those lights will be jumpered out for sure. I don't need to be reminded to check tire pressures....that's for the lazy asses who never think of it until their tires go flat on them on the road....
One plus is that they will let you know if you picked up a nail or something and you can get off the road in a safe spot before the tire goes completely flat.
I was told, by one of the people at the smart house, that the system has nothing to do with checking the pressure in the tires. It uses the same sensors that the ABS, ESP, etc. systems use to detect the difference in the speed the tires are rotating. A low tire effectively is smaller so it rotates at a different rate. The system doesn't know what the tire pressures are, only that one or more tires is/are not rotating at the same rate as the others. The system would alert you of a problem. However, assuming all of the tires are low the same amount, it wouldn't tell you anything.
I hope that's true Smarteq, we will find out for sure about the US spec. set up soon. If they are radio signal type I will have to go with "jonnysan" when driving on snow tires and switch back on the rest of the year.
I was told, by one of the people at the smart house, that the system has nothing to do with checking the pressure in the tires. It uses the same sensors that the ABS, ESP, etc. systems use to detect the difference in the speed the tires are rotating. A low tire effectively is smaller so it rotates at a different rate. The system doesn't know what the tire pressures are, only that one or more tires is/are not rotating at the same rate as the others. The system would alert you of a problem. However, assuming all of the tires are low the same amount, it wouldn't tell you anything.
Unfortunately they are ill informed as they are/were with most things. The 451 has individual sensors in each wheel valve.
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