Review: Tekton Digital Tire Gauge

One of the few things my dad taught me about cars was the importance of maintaining proper tire pressure. Too little pressure, and your car’s fuel economy goes down. Too much pressure, and your tires won’t have proper grip on the road. Under or over-inflating tires can also result in uneven and premature tire wear.

I know these things, but that doesn’t change the fact that I’ve always viewed checking tire pressure as a chore. For the past twenty years, I’ve been using analog stick type tire gauges. These type of gauge’s work, but in my experience, they’re fiddly. Getting an accurate reading always takes me a few tries because of the cumbersome form factor, which makes it difficult to correctly line up the gauge with the tire valve. Couple this annoyance with the hassle of filling the tire with air and subsequently re-checking the pressure with the gauge, and you have a task that’s tedious at best and ignored at worst.

Enter the Tekton Digital Tire Gauge (model 5941), which sells for about $10 on Amazon.

As its name implies, this device provides a large digital readout of your tire’s pressure in PSI, Bar, kPA, or kg/cm2, making it easy to see the correct measurement for values up to 100 psi without the guesswork. The Tekton Digital Tire Gauge comes with one CR2032 3V Lithium Coin Cell and three LR44 1.5V Button Cells installed. It also features an illuminated nozzle and screen. Simply turn the unit on, toggle your preferred measurement units and take your measurement.

To conserve power, the unit automatically shuts itself off after 30 seconds, so you never have to worry about accidentally running the batteries down. To replace the batteries, users will need to remove two screws and add the new batteries in. Personally, I wish that there was an easier way to replace the batteries, when the inevitable time comes to replace them.

The unit is lightweight and easy on the eyes, but the plastic feels a little cheap. The Tekton’s ergonomic form factor and non-slip texture made it very easy for me to grip. Best of all, I found that lining the Tekton gauge with the tire’s valve stem is much, much easier than the other analog gauges I’ve used up until now. For $10, there is a lot of value.

In summary, the Tekton Digital Gauge has three features make this product a must-buy:

1) It’s easy to grip
2) It does a good job providing an accurate reading
3) It features an easy to read, illuminated display

I liked working with the Tekton so much, I ordered another one for my wife’s car. While checking the tire pressure will always be a chore, the Tekton 5941 Tire Gauge makes the process easy and fast. I give the Tekton Digital Gauge 5 out of 5 Bob Weiners.

-Krishna

Krishna June 11, 2016 automotive, digital gauge, review, Tekton, tire gauge