You’ll learn in this blog post how to connect a Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) to Tools.Valarm.net.

A TPMS connects to tires on your fleet vehicles, trucks, and trailers to remotely monitor factors like tire pressure and tire temperature.

Sensors connect to each of your tires and your GPS-tagged vehicle information is sent to Tools.Valarm.net.

On Tools.Valarm.net you can map, graph, download, and analyze your sensor information to your heart’s content. Tools.Valarm.net is $6 per month for each of your fleet vehicles you need to track and monitor.

You’ll use Doran brand TPMS sensor systems in this write-up. Here are the components you’ll need for each deployment:

  • Sensor Hub (3G GSM, WiFi, or Ethernet)
  • RS-232 Sensor Adapter
  • Doran 360MTR Hub with RS-232 w/ Whip Antenna
  • Doran Tire Pressure Sensors
  • Doran 360MT Programming Tool

You’ll see in the photos of this deployment that you’ll use appropriate voltage regulators to ensure that the Doran TPMS system gets 12V of power while the Yoctopuce sensor hub needs 5V USB.

You’ll need sensor hubs and sensors from Shop.Valarm.net for remote monitoring.

Link your sensor hubs to Tools.Valarm.net by following this tutorial on How To Use IoT sensors with Valarm.

Let’s get started by logging in to your account on Tools.Valarm.net.

Go to your Device Manager. Click the Valarm Device you want to configure for your TPMS tire monitoring.

Then under configure hardware click the Configure Yocto Hub button to see what the serial number is for your Yoctopuce RS-232 sensor adapter.

In this case you see it’s RS232MK1-5937D. You’ll use that in the next step.

Close the Configure hub window.

Next up go to TPMS under Configure Data Path. If you don’t see TPMS then send us a note to Info@Valarm.net and we’ll enable it for you.

You’ll see the Configure Doran TPMS window.

You probably won’t see all of the information exactly as in the screen shot.

Click the Enable checkbox to enable TPMS.

Enter your RS-232 Adapter ID, which is the serial number you found earlier.

Type in how many tires you’ve got on this vehicle. And enter any notes on your equipment and assets that help you identify and remember this deployment.

Let’s set up your Yoctopuce RS-232 sensor adapter settings now. Make sure it’s plugged into your Doran 360MTR TPMS Hub.

You’ll use Yoctopuce’s virtualhub software to configure your RS-232 to read the raw bytes of data from the Doran system and send the TPMS information to Tools.Valarm.net. You’re already familiar with virtualhub from connecting your sensor hubs to Tools.Valarm.net.

You might find this easiest to configure by plugging your RS-232 sensor adapter into your computer for initial configuration.

Click the configure button for your RS-232 sensor adapter in virtualhub.

Change the settings to what you see in the screenshots – Frame-based binary protocol, 19200 baud rate, 8N1 encoding, flow control none, Rx and Tx minimum frame intervals at 2 milliseconds (ms).

Then click manage job files and make a new job file.

You can call it anything you want like DoranTPMS.job or leave it as default.job.

Add a task to your new job file.

Make your task a Reactive task.

Use a custom protocol.

Add a step to expect an argument.

Paste the following argument for the expect command to parse the tire temperature and tire pressure (psi) information:


(BYTE)(BYTE)(BYTE)(BYTE)(BYTE)($1:BYTE)($2:BYTE)($3:BYTE)($4:BYTE)($5:BYTE)($6:BYTE)($7:BYTE).*(BYTE)(BYTE)0[0-8](BYTE)(BYTE)

Save everything.

Set your startup job to the new job you just created.

Now let’s talk about setting up your tires and vehicles with the Doran hardware.

Use your Doran 360MT Programming Tool and use the initial function to read your nearby booster ID

Then you’ll see a Read Success window.

Confirm that the booster ID you want to talk to matches the ID your tool found.

Next up you’ll add your tire pressure and temperature sensors to your TPMS system.

Choose the Add Sensor option on your Doran tool.

Select which tire you’re entering.

Type in your tire sensor ID that’s printed on the sensor ID.

Set your baseline PSI so you know what’s normal expected tire pressure for your vehicles.

Enter all of your tires and when you’re ready to send the tire sensor ID information to your Doran TPMS booster then go back to the main menu.

Select the option to send tire sensor information to your booster.

You’ll see sending…

And then SET SUCCESS! Without the exclamation point.

Screw down and attach your tire pressure / temperature sensors on your vehicles.

Deploy and secure your boxes in your vehicles and you’re good to go!

Now you can go to Tools.Valarm.net with your favorite web browser on any device, like your phone, tablet, or laptop.

When your TPMS system is turned on and connected to Tools.Valarm.net you’ll see tire pressure and temperature information like you see in the screenshot.

If you’ve got GNSS / GPS sensors attached to your sensor hubs then you’ll see all of your information on Esri maps throughout Tools.Valarm.net. You can view the information on 2D maps as well as 3D earth globes.

In the example screenshot you see our TPMS sensor reading measured 30.8 psi (pounds per square inch) of tire pressure. And the tire temperature is 82.4F / 28C.

That’s your step-by-step how to tutorial on linking Doran Tire Pressure Monitoring Systems / TPMS to Tools.Valarm.net.

Remember that you can use Tools.Valarm.net to remotely monitor anything, anywhere. Whether you need to monitor:

Or anything else. Tools.Valarm.net is an open platform so you can use sensors made by any manufacturer, like Doran as you saw in this tutorial. And combine sensors made by different hardware companies for your organization’s particular remote monitoring needs. For example you can integrate sensors from:

And any other sensors and hardware you need to use with Tools.Valarm.net software.

Take a gander at our Customer Stories Page to see how various industries use Tools.Valarm.net for remote sensor telemetry and monitoring.

How do you share and see all of this information in an easy-to-use dashboard? See our Web Dashboards here.

Questions?

Please don’t hesitate to Contact Us at Info@Valarm.net if you’ve got any questions.