a week ago i purchased an '08 fit sport AT from a toyota dealership. yeah i know, ironic buying a used honda from toyota guys.

while driving on the highway today, my tpms light came on. to be clear, i'm referring to the light with the actual letters "tpms" and not the low pressure indicator that looks like this (!).

so i look in the manual and it says this is due to a possible malfunction in the overall system and i should take it in to the dealer to be checked. so i did just that. and they pretty much did absolutely nothing. the service manager came out after maybe 10 minutes and told me that they checked all my pressures and they were all fine. i expected as much as i check pressures at every fill-up and i just topped off a few days ago and they were all fine at that time. he then tells me that the tpms warning light is likely due to the weather we've had lately. admittedly, the weather has been pretty strange over the past week. the day i picked up the car it was sunny and in the 80's. over the course of the week the temperature dropped like whoa and just this past friday it was down into the 20's overnight. it then warmed back up pretty quickly over the last few days and we've had a bunch of rain.

i totally get that cold tire pressures will bounce around a bit when you have temperature swings and such, but shouldn't the tpms system account for that?

i dunno, i'm just not at all satisfied with this service manager's explanation. i feel like by taking a honda to a toyota guy, i'm getting more of a generic approach to solving my problem. i thought if i took it to the dealer they would hook it up to a computer and check for a code and/or possibly reset/recalibrate the sensors altogether. they definitely didn't do this. when i mentioned doing it, the service manager just said, "well that's going to be costly and is most likely unnecessary anyway. if you just drive it, i bet the light will go out on it's own." it felt to me like i was being blown off.

the invoice they gave me as i was leaving has some really vague wording as to what exactly was performed in the way of service. it mentions a reset, but i'm telling you, i don't think they reset anything. again, they only had the vehicle for 5 to 10 minutes tops.

i bought the car from this dealership just a few days past a week ago. it's still under warranty with them. should i go back and demand they fix it, and fix it right, at no cost? or is this guy right? can i just continue to drive it and the light will go out by itself?

my only other option is to take it to a honda dealership. there's a reputable one just across the street from the toyota dealership i bought the car from. the thing is, i'd have to shell out 50 bucks for them to fix it. i purchased an extended warranty with the car which has a $50 deductible. obviously, i don't want to spend 50 bucks if i don't have to, but if that's the best course of action, so be it.

 

The temp fluctuation would have no effect on the TPMS light, just the (!) light.

 

so i did get blown off, then.

i'm betting it's a bad sensor. the car is about 5 years old now. anyone know how long the factory installed sensors last? i'm assuming they have a battery in them that has to die eventually.


edit: gonna call them back tomorrow and more, shall we say... vehemently, explain my issue. now that i take a step back, i think they misunderstood me. they're probably figuring the light was trying to tell me i had low pressure somewhere and didn't realize that it's actually telling me there's a malfunction in the overall system.

 

It is a good possibility one of the wheel sensors' battery has run down.
I had that happen to my 08 Fit about two years ago, thankfully with a few hundred miles left of the warranty.
The wheel sensors have a switch in them, that turns the sensor on only while the wheel is turning.
The tech told me that sometimes the switch sticks in the closed (on) position, running the battery down.
He also told me that the sensors should normally last 6 plus years, or about 100,000 miles, with normal service.
Honda can tell which sensor is not operating correctly, so hopefull it will only require replacing one wheel sensor.
And no, the battery can not be changed, as the sensor is a sealed unit.
Gregg

 

^^ Cosign with what Gregg said.

With the letters "TPMS" illuminated in the gauge cluster, there is indeed a code set for the Tire Pressure Monitoring System. What the dealer should have done was have a tech hook up the HDS and check for TPMS codes AND/OR use a TPMS scan tool such as an ATEQ VT-30 to pinpoint if a sensor(s) failed and identify its location.

Usually stuff like this would require a diagnosis charge BUT I'm not sure how your warranty works so they may be obligated to pay said diag charge. In addition to that, if the shop tries to charge you for one tire balance they're likely trying to bend you over. Unless you have extremely low profile tires only the bead closest to the sensor needs to be broken to get access to the sensor and replace it. Use of the HDS is required in order to add the replacement sensor into the car's system.

 

i'm running 15" oem alloy wheels with falken ziex ze-912 tires. they're 195/55R15. somewhat low profile, but not what i would call extremely low.

come to think of it, i hit a pretty decent pothole yesterday, harder than i would have liked. had a huge truck coming at me on a residential street with cars parked on both sides. it was either the pothole or get my mirror stripped off. could a jolt like that bust one of the sensors?

 

Possible on the Pot Hole, but I doubt it.
Gregg

 

The TPMS light means that the car is not getting communications from at least one of your TPMS sensors. This means either that you either have a bad sensor, or someone changed a sensor and did not relearn the computer for the new sensor ID, or possibly replaced a sensor with an incompatible sensor. There are generic tools to diagnose this kind of problem. You should not need a Honda dealer. Any tire place has them and so should a Toyota dealer unless he has only Toyota specific tools.

 

I live in Tennessee and the temperature just reached 6º last night. This morning I was driving to work, and my TPMS light came on. Not the low tire pressure indicator (!). It didn't flash or blink, it came on and has stayed on. I'm hoping it has to do with the weather? Any suggestions? It didn't have any problems yesterday!

 

It means one of your sensors has failed. You can ignore it or spend $100+ to get it replaced/recalibrated/etc.

 

What this REALLY means is that the system is not finding information from all four sensors in your wheels for each of the programmed IDs. The TPMS computer is programmed to look for information from four specific sensor IDs. It is not finding that information from 1 or more IDs. The possible causes are from most likely to least likely:

1. One or more TPMS sensors are not sending data. They are broken or battery is dead. If this happened, you need replacement sensor(s) and reprogramming for the new sensor ID.
2. One or more sensors is missing. The dealer put on wheels (or one wheel) without the sensors.
3. All 4 sensors are there and working, but the car's computer is looking for sensors with different IDs. This would happen if, for example, someone took the Fit's summer wheels off and put winter wheels on and did not reprogram the computer for the new IDs. Or if there was a bad sensor and it was replaced, but the computer was not reprogrammed for it.
4. The car's TPMS receiver is fried. This is kind of unlikely.

The good new for you is that a dealer cannot sell you a car without all safety equipment working and this is safety equipment. This should be quite easy for anyone to diagnose and repair using generic TPMS equipment that can reprogram Asian cars. All they have to do is go around to each wheel with a TPMS trigger tool and see if they can trigger and get data from each. If they can, then they hook their tool up to the OBDII connection and verify what TPMS IDs the car is programmed for and send the correct data to that computer. If they can't, then they have to break the wheel down and replace the bad sensor, then reprogram the TPMS sensor IDs to reflect the new sensor ID. That's all there is to it.

Some shops have programmers that can reprogram a new sensor with the same ID as the old one. Then they don't even have to reprogram the car's TPMS computer.

 

Good news!! None of the above were true. The light came on in 20º weather and went off same day once it warmed up. No problems anymore!!

 

More than likely the battery is marginal in a sensor and you will have to replace that sensor soon. The temperature has nothing to do with it. The sensors are designed to work way colder than 20 degrees. Don't be surprised if that pesky TPMS light comes on again very soon.

Unfortunately, a service facility cannot tell you which sensor is bad unless it is not broadcasting when you bring the car in, so even with the "TPMS" light on, the sensor could be working at the moment you bring the car in, if it is intermittent. This happened to me twice. Finally I bought an ATEQ VT30 and diagnosed it myself. Then I could simply tell the tire place which sensor to change and not have to pay for any diagnostics. With the ATEQ VT30 and the ATEQ Quickset, you can diagnose and relearn the TPMS on almost any Asian car.

 

These cost around $200 right?

 

 

VT30 is under $200--gets ID's, tire pressures, etc. from sensors. Can diagnose whether a sensor is sending data or not.
Quickset is under $150--reprograms IDs to car computer. Also can get present IDs from car computer. Only works with Asian cars.