Continental added a new valve cap sensor to its lineup of digital tire monitoring products and services. The company said this sensor works with all of Continental’s digital tire monitoring solutions products including ContiConnect Live Truck and Trailer, ContiConnect Yard and ContiPressureCheck. Installation for the sensor requires minimal downtime on the vehicle as there is no requirement to dismount and remount tires. The valve cap sensor was planned and rolled out by Continental to also offer an easy path towards an integration of more robust tire-mounted sensor, the company says.
According to Continental, one of the most effective ways commercial vehicle fleets can reduce costs is by monitoring their tires. Though tires account for just 5% of fleet equipment, they can influence up to 53% of the fleet’s overall operating costs, the company says. Enter ContiConnect – Continental’s digital tire monitoring system. With ContiConnect, Continental said a fleet can monitor the health of its tires through two different types of sensors that communicate with ContiConnect’s online platform via a connected device on the truck, trailer, Yard Reader or the Continental On-Site phone app.
Continental said the valve cap sensor is an external sensor that replaces the valve cap with the sensor cap. This sensor can upfit a large fleet with limited downtime to the customer. The sensor also relays accurate tire pressure readings for all Continental digital tire monitoring solutions. If a tire needs to be replaced on the road, the valve cap sensor also allows fleets to continue monitoring their new tires’ status before installing the tire-mounted sensor again when convenient.
The second type of sensor is a tire-mounted one, Continental said. These sensors are mounted directly onto the inside of the tire and provide more data than the valve cap sensors. Tire-mounted sensors can relay tire pressure and compensated tire pressure, temperature and individual tire mileage. Tire-mounted sensors have a four-year lifespan and a battery indicator on the ContiConnect platform that can relay to a fleet when the battery is low and also provides a percentage value to the fleet owner.
