For those of us who actively buy tools that we know we won’t use on a near-daily basis, there are really two schools of thought. While it’s nice to buy the nice racing pit crew-quality stuff and keep it forever, the financial constraints of the real world mean that few of us have blank checks to write, and affordable tools should get the job done. After all, a $200 tire pressure gauge probably isn’t 20 times better than a $10 tire pressure gauge, right? Well, this YouTube video tested a bunch of gauges at a bunch of price points to figure out the best bang for your buck.
On the chance you haven’t binge-watched Project Farm on YouTube, open up like 35 tabs once you’re done reading this article because I promise it’s both addictive and informative. This channel’s all about independent, unbiased testing of stuff you might use at home, in the garage, or on your vehicle, from headlight restoration kits to non-stick frying pans. A few months ago, Project Farm took on the task of comparing 23 affordable tire pressure gauges using a pressurized air tank and a manifold with two pretty high-end calibrated and certified SSI digital pressure gauges attached as points of reference.
This testing’s resulted in a few interesting observations, most notable of which is that tire pressure gauge accuracy can vary even across two seemingly identical gauges. Same style, same brand, but one might read higher or lower than another. That’s not a great sign of quality control. On the plus side, a lot of the pencil-type gauges actually seem to perform very well, even if they aren’t the easiest tire pressure gauges to read. Most of the digital gauges also proved to be quite accurate, and although replacing batteries in a tire pressure gauge sounds like a pain, having a backlit display seems like a godsend if you’re checking your tire pressures in a dark garage. The accuracy of most digital tire pressure gauges shouldn’t be surprising, but it’s reassuring that testing seems to back up a gut theory.
As you’d probably expect, the fluid-filled Slime dial-type gauge doesn’t seem to like prolonged cold temperature exposure, which makes sense considering how temperature affects the thickness of a fluid. Hot maple syrup flows over pancakes a whole lot easier than cold maple syrup, and warm engine oil flows better than frigid cold engine oil, so this finding seems to make sense. Speaking of cold weather, it’s also not surprising that one of the Rhino USA digital gauges didn’t work after being frozen as cheap electronics don’t like cold and moisture, although it was surprising to see one of the DeWalt pencil gauges undergo, um, unscheduled rapid disassembly after being frozen. Looking at the disassembled gauge, it seems to largely be a pressure-fit design, so it’s possible the rubber O-rings just became brittle in the cold and stopped sealing.
So, do you have to pay top-dollar for a truly accurate tire pressure gauge in order to ensure safe inflation? Well, not quite, since tire pressure reading one PSI or so off of spec usually isn’t the end of the world. After all, the air in your tire heats up and expands as you drive, which is why a pressure reading from cold after you’ve parked your car overnight is usually substantially lower than a hot reading, taken after you’ve been driving for several miles. However, some of these gauges are more than just one or two PSI off, and that amount of deviation can cause some serious issues. Take the second Rhino USA digital gauge tested, which read 9.3 PSI low on the 40 PSI test, or a whopping 23 percent lower than the actual pressure in the tire.
If the pressure printed on your door jamb is 40 PSI and you use a gauge like this one, what appears to be 40 PSI could actually be pushing up against the maximum pressure your actual tires are capable of handling. Overinflation can lead to accelerated wear in the center of your tread, poor ride quality, and an increase chance of tire failure due to road impacts like large potholes, not to mention reduced traction. Worse still, your tire pressure monitoring system might not alert you to overinflation, as the air pressure in your tires would still be above target.
At the same time, a gauge that reads substantially high could result in some problems, especially if you’re likely to load your vehicle up to near its rated payload capacity. The amount of load a tire can handle depends on its pressure, and an overloaded tire could spell bad news on the open road. Take it from someone who’s experienced a few due to appalling infrastructure, blowouts at speed aren’t fun. In addition, underinflated tires will sap fuel economy, can affect your vehicle’s handling, and can wear down the shoulders of your tires faster than you’d expect. Thankfully, every light-duty vehicle sold in America starting in Sept. 2007 has tire pressure monitoring that’ll alert you if your tire pressure is too low, but Canadians and owners of older vehicles might not have that safety net.
It’s also worth noting that if you’ve changed the wheel and tire size on your vehicle, you really want to go back and recalculate your tire pressures as different tire sizes have different load ratings. For instance, I run 225/40R18 XL tires on all four corners of my BMW, and since the factory rear tire size is 255/40R17, I’ve had to hike the rear tire pressure from 38 psi to 42 psi in order to achieve a safe load capacity. For most aftermarket applications, TireSize.com has a properly handy calculator that removes a lot of guesswork when it comes to load capacity.
So what have we learned from Project Farm’s testing? Well, sticking with name brand and not buying the absolute cheapest tire pressure gauge money can buy seems to usually yield better results. Judging by how the testing went, the Jaco digital gauge seems expensive but maybe worth it at $28. At the same time, the CZC Auto pencil gauge is impressive, with a $9 as-tested price, zero reliance on electronics, and nearly a podium finish when it came to accuracy. At the same time, if you carry a cheap dial-type gauge in your glovebox, it might not be as consistent as you’d expect, as analog dial-type gauges were frequently outperformed by many pencil-style and digital tire pressure gauges. However, if you didn’t just pick up the cheapest tire pressure gauge you could find at Dollar General, what you already have might just be accurate enough. Checking your pressure with a cheap gauge is better than never checking your tire pressure at all, and there’s a high likelihood your car has a tire pressure monitoring system that’ll alert you if your tire pressure gets way too low.
(Photo credits: Project Farm/YouTube, Thomas Hundal, AndreyPopov/depositphotos.com)
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This doesn’t surprise me as I’ve never used an analog dial gauge I felt I could trust. I have a stick gauge that matches pretty close to the dubious gas station compressors, my bike floor pump, and the TPMS (though, now that I have a proper TPMS system, it just sits in the glovebox). More important to me than exact number is that it’s consistent between readings, which it is.
This brings something else to mind: I love having fairly small tires (215/45-17) again as I don’t need to rely on rarely operational gas station compressors in the event of a slow leak or to get the winter/spring swapped tires back up to pressure since ten pumps with the bike floor pump equals about one psi and it can be carried with me.
my tires are that size and i’m glad to hear I’m not the only one who uses a bike pump
I used to do this too – until I my pump ended up failing after filling a tire from flat to get it to the tire shop. I ended up getting a DeWalt portable tire inflator which I recall was pretty highly rated by project farm. Not cheap but it also saves me a lot of effort. Now that I have two SUVs with big tires, inflating +5 psi is not as much of a chore as it used to be.
They make high volume floor pumps, I bought an inexpensive one a few years back at Walmart when I had a fatbike (a mountain bike with 5″ wide high-volume tires), and even on the 265/70/17s (32/10.50) on my 4Runner I get 1 psi per ten pumps. If I have slow leak, I find 40 or 50 pumps is quicker than setting up my electric air pump. I’ve used it on smaller tires, and it’s much faster.
That’s impressive volume! I tried using it on the swapped wheels that had lost a fair amount of pressure over the winter in my Focus ST and those tires weren’t as high volume as yours, but when I was done, I felt like the Ghostbusters when they have to climb to the top of the Art Deco Gozer building. I might check into that. I have a number of bicycles, too, so it wouldn’t be bad for keeping up with them, either.
Shoot, I inherited about 6+ pencil gauges from my father in law and threw them away since I had been told that they “stick” and will give bad readings. Now I find out they would have been good enough to keep in the (manually latched) glove box after all. An analog gauge to go with my analog glove box release. Would have been like PB&J.
Personally, I keep one clipped to the sun visor in my cars without TPMS, check once every few drives or so
Related: what’s this group’s suggestion for a tire inflator? I don’t own a compressor.
Don’t know if it is better or worse than alternatives, but since I already have a bunch of Ryobi battery-powered tools, I picked up their 18v Inflator last year, which has worked well so far.
It appears the model that I got has been discontinued, and replaced by this one (https://www.ryobitools.com/products/details/33287222315).
Thanks! I have several Ryobi tools and batteries, so that would fit in with my toolset.
I own the Ryobi inflator and I recommend it, especially if you’re already invested in Ryobi batteries. Works great! We got ours for free in a 2 for the price of 1 deal at Lowes. They frequently run these deals and the inflator is always offered as your second tool. Grab one if you get the chance.
yes the ryobi inflator is great. Just watch the duty cycle if inflating big tires. let it cool every so often and it will read 1.5-2 psi over when the trigger is pressed and it is inflating. go with the pressure it says when off the trigger.
Kobalt compressor/inflator has worked great for me, as well as (surprisingly?) their electric chainsaw.
I grabbed the ryobi one when it went on sale and I’m super glad I did. Cigarette-lighter powered ones suck enough to use on a car, and are even worse for a bicycle or motorcycle.
Home Depot is running the same sale and I got one for $25 today. Thanks for the rec!
Viair has been excellent for me, accurate gauge, quick and reliable for nearly 10 years now.
My old Ford had worn and pitted rims so the tires never sealed quite right, had to check and inflate every couple of weeks, so it has had some good use.
There’s a whole project farm video about this. I have a DeWalt that I’m happy with since it runs on the same batteries as my DeWalt tools.
About 15 years ago I bought an Accu-Gage tire pressure gauge that has a hose and an analog dial. I keep it in the house and it still works great every time. However, I wanted to replace the 26-year-old stick gauge I have in the glove box with something nicer/better.
Based on my experience, I bought another Accu-Gage, but without the hose so it would fit in the glove box better. It was a disappointment, as I find it hard to get a good seal on the valve stem. It ends up just bleeding air out and not getting an accurate reading. It’s hit or miss as to whether I get it to seat correctly. Not sure if Accu-Gage’s quality slipped or if I just got a bad one.
It sounds like the stick type of gauge is fine as long as it isn’t totally cheapo. So much for my attempt at upgrading.
I use analog dial gauges, but after this article I may rethink that. What I love about the one I use most is that the hose pivots at both ends. That makes it way easier to connect, and then to read. Actually I’m just going to keep using that one. It’s probably close enough.
Anyway, my car has a TPMS system that actually shows the numbers for each tire, which is very convenient (and, I hope, accurate). Less convenient was my last car, which had TPMS, but it would just show a light when one of the tires had an issue. Then you had to get out with your gauge and deduce which tire.
My biggest issue is the ones where you can’t get them sealed on the tire stem.
As a followup, how accurate are OEM readouts? Should I trust the dash readout in my kid’s Subaru or an external gauge?
If it has a readout of actual tire pressure, it’s probably pretty accurate. If it’s one of the old rotational systems, it’s not. I’ve found the pressure sensing ones to be more accurate than cheap gauges, and less accurate than the really good expensive ones, but not to a concerning degree. This isn’t a head bolt torque setting – being within a couple of pounds is fine, and most if not all of the pressure sensing TPMS systems are more accurate than that.
I have a very nice, very expensive, BMW-branded electronic tire gauge. Because, you know how important it is for the tires to be within 1.5psi of each other side-to-side.
Came here for this comment, did not leave disappointed.
LOL – it never gets old, does it?
I really do have the tire gauge, won it by aceing a trivia contest at a BMW Club Christmas party.
Make sure you only use the BMW-branded air, too 😉
Absolutely *critical* that you use only the finest Black Forest air imported from Der Vaterland.
Just make sure to remember next summer to switch over from winter air to summer air; you could even use all them “outsiders” not from Maine since they’re all full of…
hot air. Right?
(Terrible joke…I’ll see myself out…)
If you fill it with what “summah complaints” are full of, it really makes the ride rather stiff. Stinky too.
My aftermarket head unit tells me what the TPMS sensors think the tires are at, and it’s always within a couple of whatever my mechanic tells me they set it at.
I do have a Slime-branded 12v pump with a built-in needle gauge in an emergency, although who knows how accurate that is. I’ve only used it a couple times, like nursing a slow leak to make it home.
I do hate not knowing how much air is lost while connecting and disconnecting, though.
That loss isn’t enough to cause an appreciable difference. I don’t worry about it.
I have some cheapo digital gauge + tire depth “gauge”. It seems accurate enough I guess. When I’ve had a TPMS light come on, the gauge says it is indeed low. I add air to spec, based on the gauge, and the light goes off. That is really all I need out of it.
I have a stick gauge somewhere, guess I should compare some day.
I actually ran into this not long ago. My TPMS light came on after it first got cold here so I checked it with the dial gauge I bought sometime over the summer. I’m almost certain it’s the exact same gauge from the first pic in the article. It showed pressure was low, I added air, and I still couldn’t get the light to go out even after a short drive. When I got back, I checked again but with my trusty old stick gauge and sure enough, the first gauge was wrong and all 4 tires were still low. I pumped them up again, this time checking again with the old gauge and finally cleared the light and haven’t had a problem since.
I would love it if TPMS could measure for overpressure. I’m paranoid about it because my car has a fairly firm suspension, and when I fill the tires to the specified PSI, the ride is borderline punishing. But also — what if my gauge is under-reporting the pressure? In that case, inflating the tires to spec (according to the gauge) would mean they were over-inflated. For that reason, I usually inflate to around 1-2 PSI under spec.
Having said that, I now have the ability to cross-check the measurement since I bought a Milwaukee 12V inflator with a built-in digital gauge. So, first I get a TPMS alert, then I check the tires using an analog dial gauge, and then finally attach the Milwaukee inflator to get that reading. (Hey, I did say I was paranoid.)
I am under the impression that the TPMS will light up if the tires are over pressure. I’ve never experimented, but that’s what I think. Maybe an expert here has more information?
The TPMS in my Acura lights for overpressure. The individual tire lights come on for low, the main light comes on for high.
It depends on your system. Some (probably only early cheap-ass systems) seem to only alert when there’s a variance outside of whatever threshold it’s programmed for. If everything is within the margins of the variance, it won’t know if they’re all set high or low, though there might also be a bottom or top line threshold. The TPMS on my Fords sucked and were far worse than nothing at all. Not only did they not ID the pressure or problem tire(s), but the tires could all be quite low without triggering a warning, but that didn’t matter because one of the sensors was almost always dead and the procedure to ID which one(s) were bad was terrible. The one in my GR86, OTOH, is actually worth having, though I wouldn’t have paid for it were it an option (because I’m a cheap-ass).
I used to have five gauges at once. None of them agreed, and some didn’t agree with themselves. I found one that was close enough and consistent enough for my purposes. I supplement by having the pressure checked at a tire shop once in a while.
I expected tire shop has the same problems with five different gauges showing different readings
The secret is to use one gauge?
True. But I can HOPE their fancy machine where they select the desired pressure and it inflates or deflates to match is more accurate. Of course, by the time I drive there my tires are hot, so they’ll be slightly under-inflated when cold.
9PSI off? We all have seen what happens when the tires are off by 1.5-2PSI
It’s the terror of knowing what this world is about
Watching some good friends screaming “which gauge is correct!”
And if tomorrow you drive higher, higher, high, you’ll likely gain 2-3psi.
She might whip out a night stick, and hurt me real real bad, by the road side, in the desert. She’s got me under pressure….
It happened in a ditch.
I actually prefer the pencil type, no batteries required, and hold their reading simply.
Though it helps to have your glasses on when you read it so you don’t think 40 is 20 and it’s really low and you drag your compressor out of the shed and plug everything and the compressor’s digital gauge reads 40 so you’re like wtf and finally get your glasses and go dangit and put everything away….or so I’ve heard.
I used a sharpie and drew a line at my preferred pressure. Makes it a lot easier to read.
I have the Jaco one on my compressor. Good to know it’s decent. I buy almost everything with a “buy it for life” mentality now. Everything is designed to be disposable now, destined for the landfill before it’s even left the production line and it’s just disgusting.
The disposability of modern society is alarming. I rarely buy the best, but also avoid the cheapest. I too would prefer a tool, appliance, etc to give a suitable service life.
As long as it matches your use case it’s good to go. When I traveled a lot I spent big money on a Timbuk2 backpack after killing two cheaper backpacks. It’s still with me and looks brand new. If I need a socket set I’m not buying a Snap On though because I don’t make my living with them. A Craftsman set will last me forever, just like a Snap On will, but probably costs 1/3 as much.
Same – I’m not making a living with my tools. I like my Kobalt socket set and have some older Craftsman’s from dad. Corded power tools are often mid line Harbor Freight.
My go to travel bag is LL Bean my boss gifted us (travelling engineers) a few years ago. I respect quality.
I inherited tools from a family member who was a general contractor in the 1980s-1990s. Some are worn out, but many are solid Craftsman from their heyday, Bosch, Makita, Porter Cable, made in the US or Taiwan. I bought some newer DeWalt and green Ryobi and have had no issues, even though they’ve seen a lot of use.
The only tools I’ve had fail on me are an old Craftsman ratchet where the clutch broke off, and a $25 corded Hairball Fright oscillating tool that decided to stop working one day.
Thankfully it’s still possible and not too expensive to buy tools and bags for life.
“Hairball Fright” is my favorite tool store! ha ha
So is that where DT gets tools to work on the cat Jeep?
Must be!
My go to hammer for the past 15 years is an Estwing, solid forged steel from head to handle. As long as I don’t lose it I’ll never need to replace it. I’m glad I ignored the urge to cheap out with that one.
I love a good hammer. Can’t beat an Estwing.
I find that the older I get the easier it is to “buy it for life”
When you only need it once, Harbor Freight!
Mid-tier or better HF hand tools are pretty damn good.
But I appreciate that they have the dirt cheap Pittsburgh stuff because sometimes it’s all you need, even if it isn’t the best quality. Other times, a better tool pays for itself even on just one job if it makes the job a lot easier.
Know what you need and how good you need it to be to get things done efficiently.
HF is really good when you need a lot of clamps.
Amen. I can now buy the best forever. The saved frustration alone is worth it.
“although it was surprising to see one of the DeWalt pencil gauges undergo, um, unscheduled rapid disassembly after being frozen. Looking at the disassembled gauge, it seems to largely be a pressure-fit design, so it’s possible the rubber O-rings just became brittle in the cold and stopped sealing.”
We didn’t learn a goddamn thing from the loss of the Challenger, did we?
Too soon 🙂
Read the Parker O-Ring Handbook Damn it! It is the Bible for a reason – I guess no one at NASA’s subcontractors had a copy because the design was specifically noted as not to be used.
Holy crap – I just found someone selling a 1982 vintage copy for $55 on E-Bay. Not sure if I dumped my version when I digitized everything. I do still have a couple of paper McMaster Carr catalogs handy – even if the McMaster web site is really really good – sometimes it helps to flip through the pages to get inspiration.
Project Farm does the lord’s work
All Hail Todd Osgood.
I’ve got all types, but my favorites are GH Meiser analogs, from the eponymous old school gauge company in IL. The newer ones are made overseas (work great) but I have a couple of older ones made in the US, including a solid brass and steel cased one that was my dad’s.
For the one I bought in the 90s, you could fill out the registration and warranty card, mail it to them, and they’d send you a rubber boot for your gauge. I did it on a lark, but sure enough, 6-8 weeks later, I got a hand addressed padded envelope in the mail with an perfectly appropriate dull industrial red one.
It is said that a man with a watch always knows what time it is, but a man with two watches is never quite sure.
My phone and laptop sometimes disagree about the time.
I was about to explain why but realized I’d be mansplanning. Reply if you would like the reason.
There isn’t just one reason though.
Time drift could be different on each device, time sync settings might not match, and/or they could be synchronized to different NTP servers. Or all 3 could be true.
It shouldn’t surprise anyone that different devices might have slightly different times.
To say nothing of corporate connected devices that may be getting their system time from a local server that is completely wrong. Sometimes this is still advantageous, because you may experience less time-related errors on the network when trying to connect to shared resources.
This is the correct answer
A friend who has run race cars in numerous British National and some International race series considers a stick guage to be nearly as good as the very fancy and expensive digital guage he also uses.
I’ve had a few digital gauges, and I have given up on them. Since they sit around for extended periods, batteries leak, fail, or just plain give up the ghost. And it isn’t known until actually needed, resulting in not checking pressure. I’ll stick with a stick and have a few around.
Will have to check with the dealer, but the TPMS system on our 2024 Rav4 doesn’t actually provide the pressure, just a blank space where the pressure should be.
This tool’s use case is exactly why a battery powered one sucks. It sits in a cold garage for long periods of time and when you reach for it it’s dead or broken from a leaky battery. No thanks.
Hmmm. May have to give it a watch. I have the Morrflate quad, which is pretty cool, as it inflates all 4 tires at once AND balances the amount in them, but I put a lot of faith in that digital gauge. Their branding has made it hard for me to figure out the manufacturer, so I guess that is next.
Good testing on them, and thank you for finding it online.
Stick measurer for me.
Same
I have an ancient stick in the car, but I find the analog round gauge to be more convenient. Easier to read and the button to bleed some air out is more convenient than what you have to do with the stick (which is admittedly not that hard either). But the button lets you more precisely control the amount of air you’re bleeding out.
Project Farm is so good and so widely publicized by people in various forums, I’m always surprised when someone hasn’t heard of them by now. I still can’t believe how thorough the reviews are, I watch reviews for stuff I will probably never buy just because they’re so good.
And we all know (or are) a Cousin Eddie.