What psi for tires

[tutor772]

Someone asked this same question a year ago, but I would like to hear more responses.
I traded my 07 Prius for an 09 Camry Hybrid. The Toyota recommended tire pressure for the Prius was 35/33 F/R, but people in the Prius forums recommended higher pressures. I ran mine at 40/38 F/R.
What tire pressures are people using? The recommended 32 psi? Higher? If higher, what pressure? Previous responses from a year ago indicated 38 psi, but those weren't all with the stock tires. Notice any mileage improvement at higher pressures? How about the ride at higher pressures? Thanks in advance for your responses.

[GeorgiaHybrid]

tutor,

I don't know about the rest but with the factory Bridgestones, I have been running 41 psi with a nice ride, better handling and a mileage increase of 3mpg over the "factory" 32psi.

[tutor772]

GeorgiaHybrid: Thanks for your reply.
I've only had the car for a week, so it's too early for me to make any mileage judgments. The car came from the dealer with 43 psi all around. I'm not sure they did that on purpose. I lowered it to the factory 32. The ride was definitely softer at 32, which I like, but I am worried about mileage and wear at that setting. I'll bump them up to 40 psi for a while and see how that goes.

[GeorgiaHybrid]

A lot of people here have complained about the factory Bridgestones being worn out at 20,000 to 25,000 miles. Mine have 23,000 or so on them and still have over half of the original tread left. They are noisy though and will be replaced with Michelin's when their time is up.

I experimented for several tanks before settling on 41pi. Any more and I did not see an increase in mileage and below 41, I started to see a decrease in mileage and not that much of a difference in ride comfort until the tires were down to 35psi or so.

By the way, mine are wearing nice and even across the tread.

[ekpolk]

Originally Posted by tutor772

Someone asked this same question a year ago, but I would like to hear more responses.
I traded my 07 Prius for an 09 Camry Hybrid. The Toyota recommended tire pressure for the Prius was 35/33 F/R, but people in the Prius forums recommended higher pressures. I ran mine at 40/38 F/R.
What tire pressures are people using? The recommended 32 psi? Higher? If higher, what pressure? Previous responses from a year ago indicated 38 psi, but those weren't all with the stock tires. Notice any mileage improvement at higher pressures? How about the ride at higher pressures? Thanks in advance for your responses.

I too moved from a Prius to a TCH (my son now driving the Prius). I jacked up the pressures on the Prius, and I've done the same on the TCH. I'm presently running 42 psi in the fronts, and 40 in the rears (my car also came with the Bridgestones, and will get Michelins when I can justify the switch). The TCH is so softly sprung, hard tires hardly seem to make a difference. As an aside, if I own the car long enough, I'll probably start replacing suspension components with those from the SE. My car has a few hundred over 12k miles on it, and I'm averaging 38-ish, which is substantially above the EPA figures for an 09 car. I'm staying with the 42/40 approach until/unless I sometime see a good reason to throttle back (the sidewall max for the BS tires is 44).

[Old-Crows]

I've raised the TP from 32 to 38psi this week. With less than two grand on the car, I thought I'd ease the TPs up until I find the right setting.

Thirty-two seems a tad low ... but it is a light car. On the other hand, 40+ seems a bit too high. I used to run about 41 in my Sienna's B-stone OEMs and that extended their wear considerably but that might be too much for the hybrid. Although.... the max pressure on the THC's B-stones is 51psi and maybe 40-something is a middle of the range setting and a good choice.

O-C

[YardApe]

I have been keeping my Michelins (stock) at 36psi (~44,000 miles on them and still looking AOK) but I might bump them up to 40f/38r... BTW, why the PSI difference between the front and rear? Engine weight?

[GvilleTCH]

With stock Michelins , the door sticker says 32 around. After trial and error I run 37 around , which for me is the best combination of mileage ; comfort (over Florida's road system) ; and handling...

[GeorgiaHybrid]

YardApe,

A lot of the Prius guys started using the front/rear split with different pressures and carried that over to the TCH. It is for the engine weight on the front tires and for them being both the traction and steering axle. I don't like changing pressure when rotating tires so I just split the difference and run 41. Tried 2 psi increments over a period of time to get a good range to start with and then went to 1 psi to fine tune what I have now.

[tutor772]

The factory specs. for the Prius are 35 psi front and 33 psi rear. The OEM Bridgestones on the first generation Prius wore out quickly at those pressures. The Prius owners who ran the OEM Bridgestones at 40 f/38 r reported significantly better tire wear. Also, people found (myself included) that running the same tire pressure all around on the Prius negatively affected handling, so the Prius folks recommend keeping the 2 psi differential front/rear regardless of the pressure you use.
Since Toyota recommends 32 all around for the TCH, my inclination is to keep all the pressures the same, regardless of the "running" psi.