Patent ID: 7180409

Claim:
A system for monitoring wear of a vehicle part, comprising: a user interface; at least one radio frequency identification (RFID) tag with unique identification embedded in the part at a depth indicative of a worn part; an RF tag reader that can periodically monitor signals from the at least one RFID tag; a controller coupled to the RF tag reader and user interface, wherein if the RF tag reader fails to obtain any signals from the at least one RFID tag, indicating a destroyed RFID tag, the controller can direct the user interface to warn a user of the vehicle that the part containing that RFID tag is worn; and a clock coupled to the controller, and wherein the at least one RFID tag includes a plurality of RFID tags in each tire of the vehicle embedded at different tread depths, wherein the controller can monitor the progress of tire wear for each tire by determining when individual RFID tags are destroyed, wherein if the RFID tags at corresponding tread depths of each tire are not all destroyed within a predetermined time period the controller can direct the user interface to warn a user of the vehicle that the vehicle is experiencing uneven tire wear.