Sorry, there are probably dozen threads on this but my son just called from the motorway in a panic as a bit of metal flew off a scaffolding truck and he drove over it, and a warning came up on the dashboard. 

He has a 2018 Fiesta ST-Line, and in the settings the tyre pressures are all about 2.1 which seems normal. 

But are these real time readings? In my old focus I just got a 'flat' symbol on the dash if a tyre was low and there was no actual measurement in the settings. 

Hopefully the answer is yes and he hasn't actually got a puncture. 

 

 

Hi Ed, 

I'm not entirely sure if the monitoring is continuous but guess it must be regular....certainly the tyre pressure monitoring system should have flashed up a warning if a tyre had suddenly lost pressure. 

My Fiesta is also a 2018 model and if I look at the tyre pressure display early in a journey when tyres are cold, then check the display again later when they're warm, the pressures on the second check are a bit higher, as you'd expect, suggesting the system checks frequently. 

Could I ask what warning came up on your son's dashboard? This is painfully obvious I know, but does he carry a tyre pressure gauge?

4 hours ago, EABowden said:

a bit of metal flew off a scaffolding truck and he drove over it, and a warning came up on the dashboard. 

mmmm....... that must be a new warning, I don't think I have that on my dashboard. Is it a picture of some scaffolding poles in a pile ? 🤔

4 hours ago, EABowden said:

are these real time readings?

there is a clever little device like what they use for the lottery numbers and it randomly picks tyre pressures once a week on a Saturday night 🎉

So now I'm going to assume that "a warning" was to say that a tyre had low pressure, and that it happened soon after he ran over something on the road. Yes they are real time readings and accurate to better than 2psi (0.137895 bar). When were the tyre pressures last checked ?

 

 

Is your son sure that it was a low Tyre pressure warning. If he ran over a Scaffolding Pole at speed it is more likely that he got a warning relating to the Stability or Traction control system rather than a low Tyre pressure one. I would be very surprised if he did not get one of these in those circumstances.

A low Tyre Pressure warning will be given if one of the Tyres has lost more than 20% of the learned warm pressure and will happen immediately.

I expect that when the object was hit, it caused a transient in the pressure and if the system saw the subsequent momentary pressure drop it would send a warning which it might read again a little later and revise its opinion. In answer to your initial question, there is continuous real time monitoring because if a tyre gets  a puncture, I would like to know about it now rather than next Tuesday.