California’s proposed new tire regulations

You seem to miss the point.
I’ll take that aside out, to make it easier for you to understand. :roll_eyes:

I know I keep harping on this bing, but if the public could be pursuaded to mind the basics:

Keeping up on tire pressures, and checking tread depth, there’d be no need for additional tire legislation.

Our friend’s daughter in the Philippines ran the tires on her purchase-new 2024 Vios (North American Yaris) literally into the ground.

Additionally, she purchased and installed a set of these color-coded TPS-monitor valvecaps that gradually change color with pressure decreases.

We borrowed the car, I dutifully checked the pressures with a gauge when our friend pulled into a Petron. Door placard: 32 front, 30 rear. Actual: 27-29 psi AFTER having driven from our hotel to the Petron station. One tire was balder than Bruce Willis, another was ‘on the way there’ and two were fair.

I set everything to 33 front, 31 rear, since we had drove a while. Our friend’s husband, from the states I’ve known him for a decade, said “I’m not even the one driving and I feel the difference!” The Filipino wife remarked about how the car actually steered for once..!

All was well until an hour later, pulled into a Jollibee for lunch, and noticed one tire was flat. We found a vulcanizer (tire shop in Filipino parlance) who reinflated and gave the tire a bath but could not find a leak.

We kept having flats the next two days, until our friend finally relented and bought two new Yokes to match her daughter’s OE tires. This time I requested all new basic black tire valve caps from the shop, and I removed all the TPS green-yellow-red things and placed them in a small baggie for her daughter to do with as she wished.

No more flats, no more lost pressures, the Vios was a pleasure to drive and ride in, for the remainder of our south-of-Manila tour.

Lesson learned: Check pressures and condition of tire tread monthly, and refrain from gimmicks such as those valve cap pressure thingies!

A side note: The 2024 Philippine-market Vios came with a full-size spare, not a donut, or just an accessory pump like in North America.

So guess which countries are being gypped with new cars…

Really? American market cars come with tire pressure monitors. My TPMS values are the same as my tire pressure gauge.

+1
The only time that I still use my hand-held pressure gauge is when I am adjusting tire pressure.

There are 2 things I want to emphasize about these new regulations:

1). There will be a publicly available database on all tires sold in California, which will include rolling resistance data, UTQG ratings, and other useful information. This would be a first for the US.

2). The regulations include categories for " Long Life" tires and “Ultra Long Life” tires. These would be tires that COULD be rated 1,000 and 1,400 for UTQG tread wear if the manufacturer chose to do so. It is obvious that these must exist even though the current highest value is 880.