Do you rotate your tires?

16vjohn

Vendor , w/Business number
Joined
Jul 12, 2007
Location
Salt Lake City, UT
TDI
EA288 CVCA 6MT
The rear tires have been getting noisy on my 15', checked them and there's cupping. I took it into my alignment guy (specialist), and he said he'd love to charge me, but it needs no adjustment! I've owned more than 50 cars. On every one, I've never rotated the tires. My philosophy has been that I only ever want to buy two tires at once. I'd put the new ones on the back and move the old rears to the front. It's worked very well for me heretofore... until now.

Turns out, and this is a shock to me, that this is expected when you leave a tire on the back for too long. They are being "dragged along, and don't turn when you turn the car". So, the wear pattern is such that the tires will cup.

Besides the E500, this is the first daily driver/big miles car I've owned with IRS, but the Merc being RWD and 300hp, this was never an issue. I never had this issue with my torsion beam cars. Particularly with my 98 Jetta, that I personally put over 220k miles on. Never once did the tires wear weird, except on the front and that was indeed an alignment issue.. Is this a thing? I guess I'll start doing the rotation business...
 

oilhammer

Certified Volkswagen Nut & Vendor
Joined
Dec 11, 2001
Location
outside St Louis, MO
TDI
There are just too many to list....
You shorten the life by not rotating tires... in some cases it is pretty dramatic.

You may only buy tires two at a time, but you are buying a lot more tires.

Old news. I'm under cars every day. I see the non-rotated ones, plain as day. I can pick them out walking through a parking lot, LOL.

Here is a nice example of what lack of rotation does:



Notice the left two are worn bald on the edges, these were on the front axle, and the right two have tread left but it is uneven and chopped up. Those were on the rear. This car had no alignment issues, no suspension issues, just lack of proper care.

I've seen some cars (and trucks) literally ruin a set of tires by 20k miles out of the factory from no rotations.
 
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pdq import repair

Veteran Member
Joined
Nov 6, 2016
Location
idaho
TDI
09 Jetta
I rotate old school too, cross rotate. RF on LR, and LF on RR. Unless of course they have directional tread, except snow tires as I do reverse them on the rear for braking traction.
 

kjclow

Top Post Dawg
Joined
Apr 26, 2003
Location
Charlotte, NC
TDI
2010 JSW TDI silver and black. 2017 Ram Ecodiesel dark red with brown and beige interior.
I rotate every oil change, or 10,000 miles. Purchasing at Costco includes free rotation. One other thing to point out is that if you're only buying two tires at a time, the better tread should be on the drive wheels. At least imho.
 

16vjohn

Vendor , w/Business number
Joined
Jul 12, 2007
Location
Salt Lake City, UT
TDI
EA288 CVCA 6MT
I rotate every oil change, or 10,000 miles. Purchasing at Costco includes free rotation. One other thing to point out is that if you're only buying two tires at a time, the better tread should be on the drive wheels. At least imho.
That's as controversial as the oil argument haha. Some say the best tread should be on the rear as there's a greater risk of a hydroplane turning bad if you can't keep traction on the rear.
 

ZippyNH

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 22, 2015
Location
Southern NH
TDI
2015 JETTA TDI SE
I rotate every oil change, or 10,000 miles. Purchasing at Costco includes free rotation. One other thing to point out is that if you're only buying two tires at a time, the better tread should be on the drive wheels. At least imho.
Here we go again...
Old school RWD it was ok...FWD, it can be pretty dangerous.
 

oilhammer

Certified Volkswagen Nut & Vendor
Joined
Dec 11, 2001
Location
outside St Louis, MO
TDI
There are just too many to list....
The tire manufacturers for safety reasons say the better tread should be on the back, for the above mentioned reason above. However, the front tires will always wear more on these cars, as most any car, so then the question comes into play about rotating at all, LOL... :p

But if you rotate regularly like prescribed, the tires will all wear evenly anyway. So when replaced, they ALL get replaced.

Front vs. rear tire wear is also a HUGE variable. The car, the tire, the type of driving... there can be some pretty substantial differences. City driving is harder on tires than highway driving. Taller, thinner tires wear better than wide low profile ones. Some brands/models of tires simply wear better or at least differently than others.

Good news is, unlike motor oil, which gives very little tangible information by simply looking at it, tires are all about visual inspection, and you can ALWAYS see the difference front to rear as it progresses. The idea is to regularly rotate so that the difference never really amounts to anything.

Most all FWD VAG products (as well as AWD versions, since those are all based on a FWD platform anyway save for the Audi R8 and the rear engined ones) will wear the front tires more than the rears. Usually substantially more, maybe even twice as much. And the rears will get normal scalloping, which is common. Torsional loads on the front tires are bidirectional. Meaning, they get loads from both directions as they are used to accelerate AND decelerate the car. The rears just do deceleration. The fronts also do the bulk of the turning, and under most conditions, are carrying more weight.
 

Graham Line

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 18, 2012
Location
Pacific Northwest
TDI
'12 Golf TDI 6M
I just rotate front to back, not side to side. Prop up one side of the car on stands and spend 20 minutes. Finding two matching tires for a half set is a gamble after they have been on the car 3 or four years. Would rather have four evenly-worn tires than new on one end and half-expired on the other. I don't even touch the spares.
 

showdown 42

Veteran Member
Joined
Feb 16, 2012
Location
naples,FL
TDI
2016 TDI touareg
AWD drives are a little different, If you need a new tire if you have over 15K miles more or less you need to buy 4 new tires or the transmission winds up and causes trouble because of different tire sizes caused by wear. It's one of the worries on a Touareg. I now rotate every 10k miles.
 

oilhammer

Certified Volkswagen Nut & Vendor
Joined
Dec 11, 2001
Location
outside St Louis, MO
TDI
There are just too many to list....
Not all AWD systems are the same, but yes as a general rule of thumb they should all four be very close in tread depth in addition to obviously being the same tire.
 

ZippyNH

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 22, 2015
Location
Southern NH
TDI
2015 JETTA TDI SE
AWD drives are a little different, If you need a new tire if you have over 15K miles more or less you need to buy 4 new tires or the transmission winds up and causes trouble because of different tire sizes caused by wear. It's one of the worries on a Touareg. I now rotate every 10k miles.
Just find a shop or seller (like tire rack) that have a tire lathe...
They can trim down a new tire on a awd to match the others for $40 or so.
 
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