Metal Valve Stem

I recently had two new Continental front tires put on my RT by Discount Tire in Tucson. I have the Garmin tire pressure sensor caps that integrate with my Garmin GPS to show me tire air pressure. I had the normal rubber valve stems, and I've never had any trouble with these. However, I understand the centrifugal force of the valve stem cap can potentially break the valve stem. Given this I asked them if they would change my valve stems to metal. They ended up installing metal stems as shown in my attached photos. The uninstalled stem in the photo is the 3rd valve stem they gave me for Sierra Cycles to use this coming Friday when they install a new General Altimax on the rear for me. Discount didn't charge me any extra for the 3 valve stems. It's service like this that keeps me going back to them.

Rob

ps: Thanks Mike (blueknight911) for the tire advice.

How do they work adding air to the tire.? Look nice and go well with the chrome rims...:2thumbs:

To add air you just unscrew the "cap", add air, and put the cap back on. The cap contains a small thin coin-like battery and wirelessly communicates the tire pressure to the GPS. I can see my current pressure in each tire and set the low pressure value for each individual tire. I then get a warning if I drop to my warning pressure. I put my warning at 1psi below normal, so I keep my tire pressures up to standard all of the time.

Rob

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Originally Posted by Chupaca

How do they work adding air to the tire.? Look nice and go well with the chrome rims...:2thumbs:

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Originally Posted by robhowen

....... However, I understand the centrifugal force of the valve stem cap can potentially break the valve stem.......

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I absolutely agree with you about the high level of service you are getting; it's not hard or expensive for them to do that, and it pretty much guarantees that you'll tell everyone and you'll go back for more!! :thumbup: Good Stuff!! (Not sure you should've named them publicly tho, cos now BRP will probably give them a hard time for fitting anything but Kendas!! :cus: )

However, it's your 'However.... comment that really prompted my post. I gotta ask, is there anyone out there who PERSONALLY has had a flexible valve stem break due to having these types of pressure sensors fitted on them?? I HAVE had a few metal stems broken off wheels over the years, generally on 4By's - usually driving in chopped up mud full of rocks & broken trees etc, no flex from the metal stem, hit something hard/heavy in the goop or oozing thru the rim spoke gaps, stem breaks, flat tire!! But in well over a million kms of running similar sensors on large 4WD tires, & I've NEVER had a flexible valve stem break due to the sensors on them. :dontknow: So I'm intrigued, where has this rumour (??!) about flexible stems breaking due to TPMS sensors being fitted to them come from??

I have had a few cases where it was obvious the long flexible stem was flexing a little & so the sensor was lightly touching the rim & I guess it may have broken the stem or sensor &/or marked the rim eventually/over time... a looooong time, but since most of my tires don't last much longer than 120,000 km on the rims, next time I took those tires off the rims, I swapped the long flexible stems for short flexible stems & never had any more problems like that. And taking that a bit further, most of my flexible valve stems only stay on the rims for the life of the tires, which on the 4By's, is at most about 120,000 km or so, except for a few on specialist rims where it was sorta hard to change them with each set of new rubber - so the original short flexible stems stayed on those rims thru a few sets of tires; I've ending up doing over 600,000 kms to date with sensors still on the ends of the original short flexible stems; been there through a whole lot of fairly rough 4Wheeling here in Aust, including the tens if not hundreds of thousands of kms of high speed running getting to & from the various 4WD tracks, and yet NOT ONE of those flexible valve stems has ever broken or looks in the slightest like it might be heading that way.... but still, these valve stems have been caned & worked longer & harder than those on any motorcycle I've ever run (on or off road) & in fact, longer & harder than just about anything else regularly run on the road short of heavy transport wheels!! :shocked:

So where does this story about the flexible valve stems breaking if you put TPMS sensors on them come from?!? Marking the rim or wearing the sensor casing, possibly even breaking the casing, yeah, I'd give that a 'plausible' - but seriously, has ANYONE personally had a valve stem with a TPMS sensor on it fail due to the sensor flapping around as the rim rotates & wearing the stem out to the extent that it leaks??! :dontknow:

Peter, I've never had a rubber one break either, and I've had TPMS valve cap devices for years on a wide variety of bikes. Hopefully I've not done something stupid in an effort to avoid trouble. That would be a kick in the pants.


Rob

I don't think the metal stem will be a problem on a Spyder, Robho, it's just that I've seen these comments about the rubber stems being a problem, but have never experienced that despite using the sensor/stem combination a fair bit; nor have I (so far anyway) met or heard from anyone else who has had a serious issue with them?!? Admittedly, I've met few who don't like 'the look' of the 'rubber stems', but they've had no real problems..... and yeah, the chromed or polished metal stems can look great, but are they necessary if you want to run valve stem cap mounted sensors?!? I'm beginning to think this flexible valve stems being a problem thing is a furphy!! :shocked:

+1 on Discount Tire. i have been buying my tires exclusively from them for 20 years or so, and would never consider anyone else.

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Originally Posted by robhowen

I recently had two new Continental front tires put on my RT by Discount Tire in Tucson. I have the Garmin tire pressure sensor caps that integrate with my Garmin GPS to show me tire air pressure. I had the normal rubber valve stems, and I've never had any trouble with these. However, I understand the centrifugal force of the valve stem cap can potentially break the valve stem. Given this I asked them if they would change my valve stems to metal. They ended up installing metal stems as shown in my attached photos. The uninstalled stem in the photo is the 3rd valve stem they gave me for Sierra Cycles to use this coming Friday when they install a new General Altimax on the rear for me. Discount didn't charge me any extra for the 3 valve stems. It's service like this that keeps me going back to them.

Rob

ps: Thanks Mike (blueknight911) for the tire advice.

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Years ago I had metal valve stems put on my rear wheel , however I moved mine to the right ( Disc ) side of the wheel and used a 90* stem .... this makes checking the PSI sooooooooo much easier .....and I realize that BRP is going to worry about my burning myself on the muffler ....So I PM'd them and let them know I would be really careful :lecturef_smilie:......... They e-mailed me back and told me my warranty was now VOIDED :roflblack::roflblack:, I told them I didn't have a warranty and threatening me , was not in their best interest .....I haven'y heard back yet :2excited:........... PS, Rob - your welcome on the tire thing and if you have any concerns about using ONLY 18 psi , just give it a try ..... Mike :thumbup:

just so you know that is a tpms metal valve from an aftermarket manufacturer

The only failures I've heard about with rubber valve stems is old weather checked ones or ones improperly installed, but who knows. :dontknow:

I will say that when I had my last tire mounted I wanted a metal valve stem installed and the shop didn't have one in stock that fit. The designs of the wheels don't accommodate many metal valve stems, so you have to be very selective if you want to go that route.

RUBBER VALVE: FOBO strongly recommends use of sensors with only metal valves as many as user finds that it is difficult to determine the fitness conditions of rubber valves. Use of sensors with rubber valves can cause a leak of tire blowout which it turns leads to sudden loss of control of the vehicles that subsequently leads to an accident and serious injuries. If user chooses to use rubber valves, users must regularly check if the valves are fit to use. FOBO is not liable for any untoward consequences.

Rubber valve stems will deteriorate after a while anyway. I had the tires changed on my old Harley trike and they did not change the rubber valve stems that were in the wheels. I hit some of the warning speed bumps coming up to a stop sign and the vibration broke one of the rubber valve stems off. Instant flat tire. Good thing I was slowing down for the stop sign anyway. Now I replace the rubber valve stems with metal ones first time the tires come off.

Here in Aus, the 'instructions' on the packaging for most rubber valve stems tell the tire tech to replace the valve stem with every new tire fitted, or earlier if indicated. :lecturef_smilie: So the rubber valve stems shouldn't ever get the chance to deteriorate much more than the tire anyway.... but some people &/or techs think they're 'saving money' by not replacing them that often! :shocked: :gaah:

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Originally Posted by Al_lockup

RUBBER VALVE: FOBO strongly recommends use of sensors with only metal valves as many as user finds that it is difficult to determine the fitness conditions of rubber valves. Use of sensors with rubber valves can cause a leak of tire blowout which it turns leads to sudden loss of control of the vehicles that subsequently leads to an accident and serious injuries. If user chooses to use rubber valves, users must regularly check if the valves are fit to use. FOBO is not liable for any untoward consequences.

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Yeah, and you are also told in writing by BRP to read your safety card before each ride or you will most likely crash and burn, Al. It’s called arse covering. p.s. you DO read your safety card before each trip, don’t you? :ohyea:

Pete

Of course I read the safety card before each ride........... where is it at?

Safety card? :)