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Towing and Making Sense of PSI #s on stickers

cmac7203

cmac7203

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I have the stock Firestone Transforce tires for now. They are rated for max pressure at 80psi. Payload sticker shows max psi front 60 and rear 65, and the build sticker shows the same. The million dollar question: When I tow do I air up to 80, or use the 60/65 numbers on the stickers?

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@MikeXM is right. The tires are made to go on a variety of vehicles. Specs on the tires are for tire maximums.

Use the recommendations on the sticker, which are engineer recommendations for the truck with those tires. It's related to the expected suspension loading under driving conditions for that tire (not just the weight distribution while it's sitting parked). For example, 65psi on your tires might be a 3,200 lb load capacity per tire.

Switching to different sizes, brands, or types of tires means you need to pressurize the new tires to a similar load condition. A different tire might need a different pressure for the same load. 55psi, or 80psi. Depends on the tire manufacturer. If you switch, all you have to do is look up the inflation tables for the old and new tire.
 
I just picked up my 2019 Ram 3500 Dually 6.7 Cummins, and it came with 80 PSI in all 6 tires (actually 84 in the front and 82 in the rears). On the door sticker it indicates 80 PSI front and 65 PSI rear. When I questioned the dealer on this he claimed the service people told him that the tire pressure of 80 PSI in all 6 tires is correct. The tire sidewalls indicate 80 PSI max cold pressure. Thoughts anyone?
 
Go with the door sticker. That is the proper pressure for your truck max capacity. No need to ever go higher than that.
If you travel unloaded, you can reduce them to get a softer ride.

Factory makes them harder so that during delivery prep, dealer has only to air them down instead of having to put some air in them. But, looks like they dont even bother.
 
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KEEP THE FRONTS AT 60 AIR UP THE REARS TO 80 WHEN TOWING
 
MikeXM said:
Factory makes them harder so that during delivery prep, dealer has only to air them down instead of having to put some air in them. But, looks like they dont even bother.
Click to expand...
Many dealer service techs are taught to always air up to the numbers on the cert label, regardless of what's in the bed of the truck. If I don't implicitly advise the service writer to not pump em up, they will.
 
jarnold60 said:
I just picked up my 2019 Ram 3500 Dually 6.7 Cummins, and it came with 80 PSI in all 6 tires (actually 84 in the front and 82 in the rears). On the door sticker it indicates 80 PSI front and 65 PSI rear. When I questioned the dealer on this he claimed the service people told him that the tire pressure of 80 PSI in all 6 tires is correct. The tire sidewalls indicate 80 PSI max cold pressure. Thoughts anyone?
Click to expand...

I think you know where not to service your truck from now on!
 
I just went through this with my dealer, my screen said my tires were around 90 on my test drive, I expected the service/prep guys to go over the pressures and back them down, they did not.

I looked up the tire specs on the Firestone site and when I plugged in my truck it came back with essentially what the door sticker had stamped on it. I pulled the tires down from almost 90 cold to 65 each and haven't looked back. Max sidewall is stamped at 80 cold, this is where it's so misleading, engineers state a max pressure on a tire so starting at 80, tires creep up to what our mind thinks is dangerously high say 95psi. In speaking with a Tire Tech from Goodyear at a NASCAR race here in Phoenix, I asked him about that and he said it's confusing to him and he's in the business! He said the tire is not going to burst at 90 or even 100 which is about the highest it would get starting at 80 but he felt the info on the sidewall does confuse more than help.

Check your recommended pressures at - https://www.firestonecompleteautocare.com/tires/tire-pressure/

If not rolling on Firestones, check the tire manufacturer site, they should have something very similar, I also found something on TireRack.

Incidentally, don't do what I did on my first tow when I got my 2016 a few years ago. I left the house with what was stamped on my door, 65/80 F/R cold, with the travel trailer on the bumper, a bed packed with camping gear, my better half and 3 dogs in the back seat we drove for about an hour and I decided to check pressures, no alarms, just my mind wanting to make sure thing were ok. The rears were up to about 94/95 and I freaked out, pulled into the 1st discount tire I found and asked him to back them down to 80, in about an hour they crept back up to about 94 from what I recall and armed with a pressure gauge I backed out pressure to get them back to 80. The rest of the trip was unnerving, to say the least, would we have a blowout, were the tires OK, they were brand new just installed a day or two before, did I have a good spare... you get the picture.

Bottom line, I should have left it be, I've been told by professional long haul drivers that what I did was create a bigger issue for myself, the tires would have been fine and at 94'ish they were about as maxed out as they would be and next time don't touch them.

All the best!
 
Lombana said:
Bottom line, I should have left it be, I've been told by professional long haul drivers that what I did was create a bigger issue for myself, the tires would have been fine and at 94'ish they were about as maxed out as they would be and next time don't touch them.

All the best!
Click to expand...

Yup, working on aircraft, those brakes would get a tire nice and toasty. We would only check a hot tire to see if it was at least the min PSI. We were only allowed to service a tire if it was cold.
 
carlrx7 said:
Yup, working on aircraft, those brakes would get a tire nice and toasty. We would only check a hot tire to see if it was at least the min PSI. We were only allowed to service a tire if it was cold.
Click to expand...
Hot brakes! Nasty stuff, especially considering the wheel/tire assy would typically continue to rise in temperature in the minutes after the aircraft was parked. And parked well away from other aircraft and personnel.
 
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