How well do you take care of your tires? Do you keep them properly inflated? Do you check if they're worn? How much do you know about basic tire maintenance and its impact on safety and fuel consumption?

If you care about your safety, and about saving money, it's important to understand how tires affect your car or truck's performance.

• Poor tire maintenance—not having enough air in your tires and failing to rotate your tires, among other maintenance requirements—can lead to a flat tire, blowout, or the tread coming off your tire.
• About 200 people die on the road every year as the result of tire-related crashes.

• Properly inflating your tires can save you as much as 11 cents per gallon on fuel. Yet only 19 percent of consumers properly inflate their tires. That means four out of five consumers are wasting money because of underinflated tires!
• Additional proper tire maintenance, such as rotation, balance and alignment, can help your tires last longer, which will in turn save you money. In fact, properly inflated tires can extend the average life of a tire by 4,700 miles.

Follow these tire pressure steps—they're the most important part of maintaining your tires:

Step 1: Locate the recommended tire pressure on the Tire and Loading Information Labels on the drivers' side door edge or post or in the owner's manual. (Remember, the correct pressure for your tire is what the vehicle manufacturer has listed, NOT what is listed on the tire itself.)

Step 2: Check the tire pressure of all tires.



Step 3: If the tire pressure is too high in any of the tires, slowly release air by gently pressing on the tire valve stem with the edge of your tire gauge until you get to the correct pressure.



Step 4: If the tire pressure is too low, note the difference between the measured tire pressure and the correct tire pressure. These "missing" pounds of pressure are what you will need to add. At a service station, add the missing pounds of air pressure to each tire that is under inflated.



Step 5: Check all the tires to make sure they have the same air pressure (except in cases in which the front and rear tires are supposed to have different amounts of pressure).

Remember: The vehicle manufacturer's recommended tire inflation pressure is the proper psi (pounds per square inch) or kPa (kilopascals—the metric measure used internationally) when a tire is cold, meaning it has not been driven on for at least three hours. To get an accurate tire pressure reading, you must measure tire pressure when the tires are cold or compensate for the extra pressure in warm tires.

If you have been driving your vehicle and think a tire is under inflated, fill it to the recommended cold inflation pressure indicated on your vehicle's tire information placard or certification label. While your tire may still be slightly under inflated due to the extra pressure of a warm tire, it is safer to drive with air pressure that is slightly lower than the vehicle manufacturer's recommended cold inflation pressure than to drive with a significantly under inflated tire.

Since this is a temporary fix, don't forget to recheck and adjust the tire's pressure when you can obtain a cold reading.

A tire blowout is a rapid loss of tire air pressure that can cause your vehicle to lose control. Although maintaining proper tire pressure can help you avoid blowouts, it’s not always possible. Here are some tips to help you stay safe in the event of a blowout.

The goal in any blowout is to keep the vehicle balanced and controllable. Do not panic. Any over-reaction – including slamming on the brakes or abruptly removing your foot from the accelerator – can result in a loss of control over the vehicle. Instead, you should take the following steps:

No matter which tire blows out—front or back—the steps for safely maintaining control of your vehicle are the same. The difference is in how you will feel it. In a front tire blowout, you will feel the force more in the vehicle’s steering. In a rear blowout, you will feel it more in the seat or body of the vehicle.

What to do if you have a tire blowout

What not to do if you have a tire blowout

Tire pressure monitoring systems continuously monitor the pressure in the tires through sensors located in the tires (direct system) or the use of wheel speed and other vehicle sensors (indirect system). The information collected by the sensors is transmitted to an on-board processor that interprets the sensor signals and warns the driver when tire pressure is below the minimum acceptable level by illuminating the TPMS symbol on your dashboard.

All passenger cars, light trucks and vans that are model year 2008 or newer are required to come equipped with this feature. Some model year 2006 and 2007 vehicles are also equipped with TPMS. If you own a model year 2006 or 2007 vehicle, check with your dealer or your owner's manual to determine if it comes equipped with TPMS.

There are two different low tire pressure warning indicators allowed by the Federal standard. One icon is the cross-section of a tire with an exclamation mark inside. The other is a top view of a car with all four tires exposed. No matter which TPMS symbol your vehicle has, it will illuminate on the vehicle dashboard when your tire pressure is significantly under inflated.

When the TPMS symbol appears on your dashboard, it means at least one of your tires is already significantly under inflated. You should inspect your tires and check the tire pressure as soon as possible. The symbol will extinguish after the tires are properly inflated.

On cold mornings, the TPMS symbol may illuminate for a short period of time and then turn off. This is likely caused by marginally low tire pressure that dips below the warning threshold overnight but rises to an acceptable level as the tires heat up through vehicle operation or an increase in external temperatures. If the TPMS symbol goes on and off, you should inspect your tires and check your tire pressure. The lamp should not illuminate when the tires are properly inflated.

All TPMS installed on 2008 model year vehicles and beyond are required to detect and warn the driver when the system is not functioning properly. A system malfunction may be indicated by a flashing of the TPMS symbol for 60 to 90 seconds with the warning lamp remaining illuminated after the flashing sequence. The flashing sequence followed by continuous illumination of the warning lamp will repeat at each subsequent vehicle start-up until the malfunction is corrected. You should contact your vehicle dealer for a system inspection.

under inflated tires are visually difficult to detect. It is recommended that you inspect tires monthly with an accurate gauge. The TPMS is not intended to be a substitute for regular tire maintenance.