Tyre pressure sensors on MY21 Outback

[Ric]

I recently had an unrepairable puncture in one of my MY2021 Outback's tyres, and was surprised to see it kept reading the pressure of the faulty tyre in the boot after I'd swapped it, and eventually the whole system shut down with a TPMS error.
I now know:
[1] The sensors are not purely powered by movement, they contain a lithium battery rated for 7 years life.
[2] The factory spare wheel does have a sensor,but it has not been "activated". It won't work until this has been done. Your dealer can do it during a service, or most tyre shops should have a programming tool to do it (they're about $350 on eBay) (edit. see next post!)
[3] Once all five wheels are "activated", the car should auto detect which sensor is on which corner of the car (and ignore the spare in the boot) (Edit: MY2023 onwards)

TPMS1.jpg (68.48 KiB) Viewed 539 times

TPMS2.jpg (70.15 KiB) Viewed 539 times

[Ric]

I had my Outback serviced today, and asked for the spare wheel sensor to be activated.
They initially told me the spare wheel doesn't have a sensor. I had photos of it, so I knew this was untrue.
They then said that the MY21 Outback can only track 4 sensors, so if you put the spare on the car, you MUST visit a dealer to get it reprogrammed to read the right four sensors.
Apparently from MY23 on it can store 5 sensor IDs, and handle it automatically.

[Yowie]

In your view, is this level of gadgetry still a net positive, or are the gremlins, costs & complications eroding that?

(I would ask a BMW owner the same question, but it would mean talking to one).

[Ric]

In your view, is this level of gadgetry still a net positive, or are the gremlins, costs & complications eroding that?
...

In general, I love the new technology.

In this case, the TPMS system warned me that one tyre was down to 20 PSI less than a minute after leaving home.
It is a little annoying that the previous model has a button under the dash specifically to allow the owner to recalibrate all the sensors, but that was eliminated in Gen 6.
Plainly that caused bad feedback, and it was improved for MY23.

Similarly there is now an update for the infotainment system that gives direct access to the engine start/stop enable, and seat heater controls, without having to go through menus.
That was a free update I had installed at the previous service.

It still irks me that if my connected phone receives an SMS (even a SPAM one that the phone automatically deletes) a big message comes up on the navigation screen asking me if I want the message read out, or to ignore it. This totally obscures the navigation, requiring you to touch a button on the screen to clear it.
It's super annoying because it already has a facility to shrink the phone info to the top line of the display. It should do this automatically if you're using navigation...
So, it's just a software issue they could easily fix.

Another thing, there's now hundreds of settings in the car, and no way for the owner to back them up and restore them, despite the system having a USB port & wifi & Bluetooth.

[Yowie]

Cheers for the detailed answer.

We have two 2009-ish Subarus in the house at the moment. It occurs to me that replacing one with something more modern will mean putting up with more of these gadgets & intrusive features that I (curmudgeon) find intrusive and irritating.

Either that or stick with older cars and work a bit harder keeping them going.

[Ric]

Either that or stick with older cars and work a bit harder keeping them going.

That's what I keep my 1957 MGA Coupe for.