Dealership didn’t rotate my tires!?

Get some consumer reports third-party involved, a sting?

 

Good move - I never rotate my tyres. It's a crazy idea, you can't work out if there is a problem with the suspension if the tyres are moved all over the place.

Plus - the best tyres MUST always be on the back axle.

Let the fronts wear out, replace them and put the good ones on the back, rotate the back ones to the front at that stage.

If it's a new car, sometimes you don't have a choice - but past warranty, I put a note on the dashboard - "Please do not rotate tyres, nor spray them with that sticky stuff."

BUT - if they charged for it - ask for a refund.

 

I stand corrected on the service part. It isn't in Europe, I wasn't aware it is still a thing in the US.
Also, maintanance every 5,000 miles or 6 months? Wow that seems very much like "I want my dealers to have some work". It is not uncommon for modern cars to have service intervals of 15,000 miles.

 

In US, when you buy New Toyota, first 2 years or 25000 miles (the first 5 maintenance service) is included in the purchase price. So tire rotation for the first 5 times are free.

 

Sure you can.
IF you give them a careful inspection BEFORE each rotation.

And it's not crazy at all.
In effect you are saying that every tire maker and car maker in the world is "crazy".

Minor wear differences can end up causing one tire to fail prematurely.
With proper rotation, the "set" all ages at pretty much the same rate.

 

You can get odd wear from things like the crown in the road (the tires wear slightly cone shaped, causing a pull), and from non-driven tires that only brake (typically causes feathering of the tread blocks, which can cause noise). Semi-regular rotation, including "flipping to the drive axle", can keep wear even allowing tires to be replaced in a matched set.

Rotation is also a good excuse to take a close look at the brakes and suspension bits, without the wheel in the way.

 

False. If not rotated, the front tires wear faster than the rears. They would wear out prematurely. (while the rears would have plenty of life left on them)

False. If they're not all the same, as they would be if properly rotated, The best tires should be on the front, since the front tires handle steering, acceleration and the majority of braking forces.

[quote="Maarten28"'so if your fronts wear out quicker and you need to replace them, put the rear tyres on the front and the new tyres on the rear. Nothing to be furious about, no false advertising and I think you are overreacting a bit.[/QUOTE]
That's subjective, but I would be mad too. To pay a dealer for a service and then they take the money without doing the service is theft. That's something to be mad about.

 

I've often heard recommendation, if for example you're just replacing two tires, to put them on the rear. Again, that rationale that the good tires should be on the rear.

I've never been able to understand that though: on the rear they will tend to wear slower, will never catch up with the wear amount of the older tires on the front.

Hope I haven't opened a can of worms...

 

You might have already... I follow this recomendation.
https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=52
"When tires are replaced in pairs...the new tires should always be installed on the rear axle and the partially worn tires moved to the front."

 

The only thing I could think of is that when the tires are BRAND new, they will still be slightly slick with mold release compound. That would be gone within 20 miles on a car tire.

(later)

OK, I just read that article. The idea is that deeper tread on the rear would make it less susceptible to hydroplaning, and hydroplaning is worse on the rear than the front, since understeer is generally not as bad as oversteer. I guess that makes sense just for hydroplaning and is only relevant when tires are replaced in pairs, like when some lazy service person didn't rotate them so they wear evenly.

Other than the hydroplaning scenario, how about more common scenarios, like hard braking or possibly the need to swerve to avoid something? Front tires are generally more important.

Tires should be rotated every other oil change and should therefore wear evenly and be replaced all at once. New tires everywhere, old tires (but no bad ones) everywhere.

 

In some cases, it is not the lack of rotation but rather for a economic reason I replace a pair rather than all four tires. For example, when I have unrepairable flat on one tire halfway through its tread life, I usually change only a pair of tires instead of all four to save money. In this case, I put brand new tires on rear and bring two of the best old tires to front.

 

I agree with you.
In addition, I KNOW how to handle a rear slide-out should one occur.
Pretty much NOBODY knows how to handle a loss of traction on the front.

Yet it seems that most all industry "experts" agree that the best tires should go on the rear.
Makes no sense to me.

 

Sorry, but that's not correct - I've got it in writing from Dunlop, and have read it many times over the past 50 years, the good tyres MUST be on the back wheels. Put the good ones on the front, and your back will spin out far easier than the front will understeer into trouble.

Have a look at a 911 - a car which was tail-happy (particularly in the '60s/'70s). Check the width of the back tyres - 2 notches wider than the front to balance the car (that was in '75 when it was first pointed out to me, not sure what today's are). I had a VW with rear-engine at the time, and it was common for VW owners to put either better or wider tyres on the back, and it improved stability dramatically.

If you go back to the '60s where Radial Ply Tyres were making an entry, it was mandated that if all 4 tyres weren't replaced at the same time, the Radial MUST go to the rear. Which is what happened when I replaced 2 tyres on my FJ Holden. It drove beautifully with the new tyres.


I was 17, and "knew better". Next day, I jacked the car up and swapped back to front - as I deduced "of course the front wheels do all the steering and braking". I eagerly took it for a "spin". Which was almost a spin. The car was almost uncontrollable, oversteering dramatically. Back home and swapped them back - BEST TYRES ON THE BACK from then on.

 

I don't have other people work on my cars very often, usually warranty work and recalls but I have had the worst luck with tires. I don't have a tire machine or a balancer but usually rotate my own tires.
It seems like I buy one set of tires a year for different cars.

 

I found the letter from Dunlop - I did have a couple of earlier articles, but they've hidden themselves.

The situation was that I'd bought 2 tyres for a car and instructed the installer to install the NEW to the BACK. He refused. I spoke to his manager who agreed with the installer. I went elsewhere. They were quite happy to do as I requested and when I told them about the other mob, shrugged their shoulders. But we got talking and he mentioned that it was definitely Dunlop's instruction to install NEW to the BACK - so I wrote to Dunlop to double-confirm. Here's their reply:

 

Then you're probably under the assumption that you need to replace all 4 tyres at once. There is no need for that.

Not true. The bad tyres have worse traction. If you brake hard and the rear locks up and starts to skid, it will want to pass the front, so even under braking you will end up standing nice person forward. Even losing traction in corners will make you spin around. Bad tyres on the front won't do that, you'll only slide forward and the natural reaction to do nothing or brake will help make the situation better.

Sorry, but the reverse is true. Loss of traction on the front (understeer) is the easiest thing to recover from. Loss of traction on the rear is generally unrecoverable, unless you have proper training.

Have look at this clip:

 

Having driven a car with newer tires on the front in the winter time back before traction control and ABS, it was a total handful to drive, always wanting to fishtail. That's fun in a parking lot, not so much when driving in heavy traffic. Rotating the newer tires to the rear made the car much more manageable.

When the front tires slip, the car goes straight and scrubs off speed until traction is regained, so it's inherently a stable system. The natural tendency to take your foot of the gas will cause weight transfer to the front, helping the situation. When the rear tires slip, unless you counter steer really quick, there's a danger that the car will rotate past the point of no recovery. Worse, taking your foot of the gas will transfer weight to the front, making the situation worse.

Having driven a number of RWD cars in the snow, I believe myself to be reasonably competent at counter steering into a slide. However, there have been quite notable cases where it has gotten away from me. For example, taking a right turn on onto a busy road I decided to have a bit of fun, let the slide go too long, and ended up doing a 180 and pointing the wrong way on the road. That gave me a great view of the traffic light turning green and unleashing all that heavy traffic, which was quickly followed by the fastest 3 point turnaround you ever saw

 

I HAVE the training.....and the experience, about 50 years of it.....and MY new tires will go on the front, if I ever am in that situation again (which is doubtful).

BUT.....it is easier to break the back loose in a turn and most drivers probably have never experienced that and have no idea what to do to recover.

Understeer and complete loss of front grip are two different things, however.
A bit of understeer is easy to correct.
Fronts sliding as if on ice is NOT something that even most "trained" drivers can deal with effectively.

You do whatever you think is right for YOU but my best tires go on the front.

 

Thanks Samantha and Maarten for taking the time to post. It seems many of the industry experts recommend what (to me) is counter-intuitive.

If I ever get to the situation where I'm replacing tires two at a time again, I'll put the newer ones on the rear.

 

Just goes to prove; you can lead a horse to water, but you can't force it to drink. I feel sorry for all those professional drivers who wasted their time and energy in proving their point. They should have just contracted Sam!