I have a 2010 Fit. Last week my low pressure TPMS light came on because there was a slow leak in the right rear. I re-inflated the tire to the proper pressure and then drove about 1/4 mile until the light went out as would be expected. Today I removed the wheel to get the tire repaired, and in it's place, I temporarily installed another wheel with no TPMS unit. I then drove about 5 miles to the tire shop, and to my surprise, the TPMS malfunction light never came on. Has anyone experienced this behavior?

I know when I lived in the frozen north and in the winter when I switched all four wheels to snows, that had no TPMS units the TPMS malfunction light would come on, and stay on until the Spring when I changed back to my non-winter wheels. However, today was different; three wheels had TPMS units, one had none, and no warning lights came on after several miles of driving.

 

That is not my experience. I thought if the gizmo in the tire was missing or I’d the gizmo wasn’t registered to the system the light would illuminate. Interesting.

 

Edit: I knew better than this.... I was thinking about my wife’s Wrangler while writing this.. As stated below, and with the GK cars in mind, no sensor actually exists and it’s using the ABS system to count tire revolutions.

Original false idea left for context:
Were you hauling the other wheel to the shop while it was still properly inflated? So it was still within frequency range?

I’ve seen a situation online where a guy hid a tpms sensor in a tube and pressurized the tube to fake the pressure system, thus allowing the person to trade in the vehicle

 

The other wheel was in the car on the trip to the shop, but not there on the trip back. The trip is about 3 miles in each direction. Still no warning lights.

I have read about the pressurized tube trick, but also heard it didn't work because the sensor works on some tire rotation principle.

 

 

It can take 15 or so miles before it registers that it is missing. It seems to happen quicker with all 4 sensors missing like when switching to winter/summer wheels but I think if you continued to drive further it would come on.

 

I'm thinking the distance driven and period of time just hasn't been long enough to yet trigger the signal. I expect it to trigger eventually.

 

I did with a passenger side rear wheel for 10 mile test.

Which wheel did you run "naked" without a TPMS sensor?

 

Mine was also right rear passenger side.

 

I have 3 spare 4x100 lug wheels from another car (No TPMS) with bald tires, which I can use to run an experiment but it'll have to warm up / snow melts before I try it.

In the past, I had the TPMS light come on (Not Low Pressure light) when an individual sensor battery died, so not sure why my earlier experiment (swap the passenger side rear with non-TPMS wheel) didn't trip the alarm. I certainly drove it enough miles but nothing happened. It started to rain, I chickened out (December) and put it back to original.