Friday, Jul 24, 2009 at 16:09
My previous experience was with ABR's Jette 400B set-up. Whilst they worked okay, to me they were too fiddly as far as re-arranging them when I had altered pressures for a different terrain type.
Also, they came with a small aluminium locking ring (which seemed like a really great idea). This ring had 3 tiny Allen grub screws and the purpose/design was that it went onto the valve stem first, followed by the sensor. Once it was all in place, you used the Allen key to tighten-up all 3 grub screws. This was a great idea, but if you used it, it would take you an hour and a half to air-up/down every time.
So, what I had planned to do (but never got around to) was to get the
tyre blokes to remove all my tyres from their rims. As each rim was made available, I was going to drill another hole in it for a 2nd valve stem (the type used for mag
wheels..... a short steel jobbie). This new hole would have been drilled on the opposite face of the wheel to where the existing valave stem is AND it would have been drilled as close to vertical as possible and as close to the spokes as possible. The benefits of this would have been:
(a) slightly easier to balance
(b) could use the locking ring gizmo as the sensors wouldn't need to be removed whenever you wanted to add/release air (you'd be using the original valave stem for that job, dummy!!! hahaha)
(c) the fact that it was tucked in closer to the spokes would mean it would be less vulnerable to damage from rocks, sticks, branches of low-lying shrubs etc
So, once the R&D people get their collective acts together and develop a Roachie-friendly set of monitors *** , I will buy a set.
*** My definition of "Roachie-friendly" monitors are ones whereby you set the actual tyres to the pressures you want.....let's say 18psi, cos you're just about to drive on a beach. So, I jump back in the cab and, looking at my fancy
monitor on the dash I see a few buttons. I am required to hold-in 2 of these buttons for a certain amount of time (let's say 30 seconds). During that 30 seconds, the unit is in a "receptive/reset" mode. It is gathering in the ACTUAL pressures I have just placed in the tyres and it starts flashing them up on the screen. Once all the tyres have registered their respective pressures, a nice little buzzer (or even a little tune if you will) sounds to let me know that all tyres have been captured. I can then release the 2 buttons, knowing that the machine now knows what pressures it is supposed to be looking for from each
tyre.
I don't want to have to go to each
tyre (on the
monitor) individually and drop them one at a time from 30psi down to 18psi...... that would take me (as opposed to a normal person) about 25 minutes!!!!
I'll keep on waiting and dreaming. Those to whom I have outlined this scenario have said it can't be done.
However, I am reminded of my early experiences with GPS set-ups. I got so frustrated at not being able to work out how to use my Etrex that I sold it and vowed I'd never buy another GPS until they made an idiot-proof one...... One that if I was dropped in the middle of nowhere and given the device, I could get a map of Australia and zoom in/out as much as I needed to find out where the hell I was. Daa-daa.... I now have a Nuvi 660 (but there are about another 4 million brands that all do the same thing).....
Roachie
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