I was told by two different tire places that my wife's car (2015 CX-5) uses the ABS sensors to detect if one wheel is spinning differently than the others. A flat tire rotates faster than one full of air because it's smaller.
I had the warning light come on twice recently: once, I pulled over to the shoulder when an ambulance was approaching. As I accelerated to get back on the highway, the warning light came on. I thought I'd run over a piece of glass or something. Using the gauge showed nothing wrong. Reset the TPMS.
Later, we were starting on a 30-mile drive down a gravel road in Eastern Oregon. The TPMS light came on. I took a deep breath, kept driving and after we reached our destination, I reset the TPMS and it hasn't come on since.
My conclusion is that I accelerated too quickly on the shoulder and some gravel or debris made a wheel spin faster. The second time, there was presumably more gravel on one side of the car and again one of the wheels spun faster.
My wife's car is 2WD. I wonder if either would have happened in an AWD.
Nah, it's probably not slight wheelspin because that would be a normal case that's handled by traction control. It wouldn't make sense for the system to both control wheelspin with traction control AND report it as a low tire pressure condition. Presumably the TPMS alert would be triggered by a longer term rotational difference. It happens for all kinds of reasons (eg, going into colder temps).
I had the warning light come on twice recently: once, I pulled over to the shoulder when an ambulance was approaching. As I accelerated to get back on the highway, the warning light came on. I thought I'd run over a piece of glass or something. Using the gauge showed nothing wrong. Reset the TPMS.
Later, we were starting on a 30-mile drive down a gravel road in Eastern Oregon. The TPMS light came on. I took a deep breath, kept driving and after we reached our destination, I reset the TPMS and it hasn't come on since.
My conclusion is that I accelerated too quickly on the shoulder and some gravel or debris made a wheel spin faster. The second time, there was presumably more gravel on one side of the car and again one of the wheels spun faster.
My wife's car is 2WD. I wonder if either would have happened in an AWD.