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Real world results
not to bump this thread, but...
I bought the PressurePro (PP) monitors early this year. We travel from Houston into Colorado every year, and the mountain passes cause a certain amount of stress to my co-pilot (lets just say if there was a brake pedal on the passenger side, she would STAND on it all the way down each pass).
Never one to pass up a cool gadget, especially one that might meet with spousal approval, I bought the PP with four monitors for the trailer only. Anything safety related in the moutains is sure to get a thumbs-up approval!
They were nice to have on the drive from Houston to Steamboat in the spring. Every morning, they confirmed that my pressure was OK, and for each rest-stop, I just checked tire temperature with my nifty Radio Shack infrared thermometer (told you, I love gadgets).
Anyway, during the summer, we store the trailer in Colorado and fly back-n-forth, so we didn't use the monitors. I put them back on the Airstream for the return trip to Houston last week.
We generally make the trip in 3 days, with the last day being a hard push from Amarillo (Palo Duro State Park) to Houston (12-hours on the road).
Starting out that morning, I scanned the pressure monitors, and noticed that one tire was down a few pounds... no problem - I'll just keep an eye on it.
By early afternoon, it was down a few more - just short of setting off the alarm. So I pulled out my nifty truck-size air compressor (another gadget) and filled it back to full pressure.
Two hours later, the PP alarm goes off. Her foot STOMPS on the imaginary passenger-side brake and we both go "What The H*** is THAT?" Then we realize its the PP.
Quick check of the PP panel - pressure is just crossing the alarm threshhold on the troublesome tire, but holding. No panic, but lets get off the road.
We pull into a closed weigh-station a few miles later - everything else seems OK. No bubbles, no cuts, no nails. Fill the tire back up and keep going at a reduced speed. Why continue? WE ARE BEAT! We're only 3 hours from home.
Here's the unsung advantage of the PP - we could keep going knowing that it was monitoring the pressure for us. We didn't feel we had a catastrophic failure pending and we were almost home.
I do feel that without the PP, and because we were pushing hard, we might not have caught the dropping pressure. That could have resulted in a catastrophic failure with all the damage to the Airstream that you read about in this forum - not to mention the inherent danger of any blowout!
We made it home fine. Her main comment: why don't we get monitors for the truck, too!
Postscript: turns out, the tire in question was OK. The stock steel painted wheel had developed a longitudinal crack visible only in the water-immersion test. Andy at Inland RV educated me on what that means (bad axels, in my case) but that's a whole other thread!
Second postscript: knowing what I know now about the failing wheel, I would have changed to the spare. I didn't know wheels could split!!!!
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Hey, its the only way to be sure!
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