The Tire inflation debate...

[Tankota]

Have you even realy read what it says on the tire? The pressure listed on the tire itself says "maximum". Not suggested, not even what tire pressure it should be set. It only lists the maximum. Tire manufactures have no idea what car the tire will be used on, what the weight load on the tire will be, or anything else. All the listings on the tires are the max load, max tire pressure, and max speed the tire has been tested to. Nothing at all to do with the tire in real world use on a vehical. That pressure is set by vehical for that size tire. And it's listed on the door. And yes, if you inflate that tire to the maximum listed on the tire, and you are not using it on a vehical that is at the max weight listing on the tire, it's overinflated.

And yes, Toyota are recomending the settings for safty.. not overinflating the tire, not underinflating the tire. They are listing the correct, safe tire pressure for that size tire, regaurdless of who makes it. That pressure will provide the max traction, cornering, stopping, and acceleration. If you overinflate it by doing what you suggest, inflating a tire to it's max tested PSI, then you will lose some if not all of this. For what, 1-2 MPG? Maybe? You won't find much a diffrence in MPG overinflating a tire. You can lose some by underinflating a tire. And it's very unsafe to be running around on tires inflated to the max listed on the tires.

Originally Posted by why?

Toyota engineers are recommending settings for 1 thing only - safety. They have to assume everyone that drives the car shouldn't really have a license, so they have to make all settings super-conservative so that the morons don't kill themselves and Toyota doesn't get sued.

No one ever recommended over-inflating tires.

Tire manufacturers know more about their tires than Toyota does. They know what is safe, and what the tires will handle.

Using the maximum pressure of a tire will not cause uneven tire wear as the manufacturers have created the tires to run at that setting.

It is always best to trust the manufacturers of a component over the manufacturer of the entire car.