Most of what I have been told is that if you buy two tyres, they should go in the front. The reason I've heard is that new ones are less likely to fail catastrophically and tyre failures are more likely to cause a crash if on the front.
I had this problem at Costco recently. I wanted the new tyres on the front were I could feel what was going on. I wanted the existing rears with 6mm of tread to stay on the back. Costco just pointed at their wall sheets and put the new ones on the back. I had to swap them over as soon as I got home.
I disagree. I have driven well over a million miles (1.6 million, actually) and have NEVER had a "catastrophic" tyre failure, so this is a very unlikely argument.
If you have worn tyres on the front, they are more likely to cause oversteer on a wet road, which is less difficult to control than
If you have slippy tyres on the back, you are likely to have a rear end skid which most people nowadays don't know how to handle.
The reason why some might think that new tyres should go on the front is that most cars are now front-wheel drive and have long service intervals, so the front tyres tend to get more hammer and wear out quicker(most of the braking and acceleration comes from the front), and balding tyres are not picked up at the next service before they get dangerous. I would contend that balding tyres are easier to spot on the front than the back in any case, when you turn the wheels.
The answer is to swap tyres front and back at service time, check them at least weekly for wear and pressure, and replace them at 3mm tread depth. I also have also got into the habit of looking at my tyres every time I get into the car to drive, or am a passenger. you would be surprised the number of dodgy tyres you can spot, and bring it to the attention of the owner: you could save their life.
J.
So we got one vote rear three votes front. (Actually re-reading Jacques - he might have agreed with Ed but got his front and rear mixed up) Sorry guys but I have to agree with Ed. New tyres go on back - I've actually done a
360° on a rented car because of this, nice ...In article , Jacques Hankin writes
I have, and it was on the front, and it was at 70mph in the "fast" lane of the M40. And I was extremely impressed by my Triumph 2500S because there wasn't the slightest hint of losing control, merely a distinct message that Something Was Wrong.
(I agree with Jacques about the rest of what he wrote)
"Jim Warren" realised it was Wed, 3 Sep
2003 20:20:13 +0100 and decided it was time to write:
About a decade ago, when I was still working for the Dutch mystery of transport, I was treated to a very good and expensive, week-long driving course. During a classroom session on grip, there was a demonstration involving a model car, some plasticine and an incline. First, the front wheels were blocked with the plasticine; the car went down the incline fine and straight, even though the front wheels had lost all grip. Then the rear wheels were blocked and the car was all over the place while going down the incline. Of course, there were unbelievers in the classroom with all sorts of excuses, among which was the one you just made. We subsequently went out on the wet circuit and could try the theory out on real cars, both front and rear wheel drive, with bald tyres on the front or on the rear. The theory proved to be spot on, as many tyre manufacturers (and people who've been on expensive driving courses) will confirm. Believe me, in normal road driving, you always want the best tyres on the rear axle, no matter where your engine or driven wheels are.
The votes are tied 3 to 3, but experience suggest new tires on the back
In article , Yippee writes
Hmmm... I may have test this. But just to get things straight. I'm assuming the wheels were locked by the plasticine, ie. as with the brakes on? So in the model example a car with the front wheels locked and rears free-wheeling went down fine, and the other way didn't? Definitely counter-intuitive (counter-physics..) at first glance.
After a little thought, and having just put a new set on the rear of my front wheel drive car, I think I'd advocate putting them on the front. From a safety point of view, with greatest accident risk being in the wet, I'd say that the ability to straight line brake as well as possible would result with the new, deep treaded, tyres on the front. It seems to me that a need to stop quickly in the wet is likely to be more common, and more outside one's own control, than the risk of loosing the back on corners, which is almost entirely down to the driver and therefore easily avoidable.
What???? AM I missing something....? Okay so you do an emergency stop on a wet bend.....spin spin spin.... Or the road surface is uneven... the fronts grip well, one of the shot backs doesnt and its spin again...
You want the good tyres on the back always and no argument will evr convince me otherwise fwd or rwd or even 4wd.......
Jonners
Jon Tilson (jpt snipped-for-privacy@blueyonder.co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :
We'll ignore the fact that to get in that situation you're obviously driving like a complete tosser, and the tyres shouldn't be left until they're anywhere NEAR that bad before being replaced....
To my mind it's utterly straightforward.
It's easy to tell which end uses the tyres harder - which end do they wear faster?
If the front wears faster than the back, put the new 'uns on the front. If the back wears faster than the front, put the new 'uns on the back.
It's totally impossible to generalise - for example, some of the big Citroens left the factory with narrower tyres on the back than the front, and manage to drive quite succesfully with one rear wheel missing, thanks to about a 70/30 weight distribution. Why on earth would better tyres be needed on the back than the front? I've run 2cvs on 145 front/125 rear, and they handle *beautifully* - far better balanced than with the same size all round
- why on earth would I put newer tyres on the back?
Equally, on many rear-engined cars, I'm sure the handling is such that you'd have to be a fool to put the good stuff on the front.
Think also on this - where does the weight transfer go when you brake heavily? Forwards. The back tyres unload, which means they're doing less work. Therefore, there's less of a need for them to be as grippy, as they're trying to control less weight. In a bend, the weight will go towards the outside front. THAT's where you want the best rubber, the corner that's doing the work.
The other argument I've heard on this is that if the front tyres are legal regarding tread depth then they are more than adequate to shift water as required under normal driving conditions (abrnormal = slow down !).
But in the dry, the bedded in tyres will give the better grip - so leave them on the front and put the new on the back.
In article , Jon Tilson writes
I was including some ad hoc risk assessment. Like I said, if you need to do an emergency stop, on a bend, in the wet, then it's pretty much your own fault. Or as someone else has put it "driving like a tosser".
Any time that you are driving close to the point of loosing wheel traction it's your own fault - diesel excepted.
It maybe the most suitable for you, if your driving style is indicated by the above. But as my car is front engined, front wheel drive, and has ABS, I think the new tyres would be safest on the front. As it is, they're on the back, but since the fronts have a fair bit of life left and I don't intend to drive in a manner whereby it will be an issue, I'll probably leave them on the rear for the time being.
Jamie realised it was Sat, 6 Sep 2003
11:59:50 +0100 and decided it was time to write:
Another popular myth.
How is ABS going to help you in a downpour, when your rear tyres with sub-optimal thread start to aquaplane and cause the car to spin in an instant? Once you're past a certain, not too large angle with the road,
*nothing* is going to save you, not even the most advanced electronic trickery. It happens before you even know it, I've seen cars on perfectly straight roads pirhouette off into the scenery, because their owners believed their front tyres were good (some even believe good front tyres will 'drive the road dry' for the rears) and ABS would save them.Darwin was right.
In article , Adrian writes
This argument is entirely fallacious[1].
When the weight is transferred to the front, the rear tyres have less load on them, and the laws of physics[2] mean that they have less ability to provide sideways grip. Since the vehicle is being decelerated by the front tyres, it is _only_ the sideways gripping ability of the rear tyre that stops you spinning.
Best rubber on the REAR if you ever want to brake hard.
[1] Various alternative words had occurred to me, but it's before the watershed. [2] lateral frictional force limit is approximately proportional to the downward force applied.
I'm not sure that the requirements are that different, let me see if I can put my think cap on .... on the FWD (with all the front-biased weight distribution) the rear will have less weight therefore adhesion, I believe, goes down. This might suggests that the rear-wheels should have the new tires ...
All in all, if the suspension isn't keeping the front and rear tires on the road, its a moot point...
Probably why Peugeot used to fit a cunning little device that reduced the rear braking when the car started to stand on its nose.
Ron Robinson
In article , Adrian writes
Bollocks! The provision of sideways grip under reduced loading conditions is ALWAYS and by a large margin the most difficult part of a tyre's job. Even when braking in a straight line it only needs the slightest imbalance in road conditions or brakes across the front axle to put quite a large sideways load on the rear tyres.
No I'm not. I may drive mostly such cars... no actually that simply isn't true any more. The vast majority of the driving I do is in modern FWD cars with very good suspension. The laws of physics hold true exactly the same way.
And you're wrong, because your assumption that FWD/RWD makes the slightest jot of difference falls apart rather blatantly when that kid steps out in front of you and you hit both the brake and the clutch together.
Keep up at the back there! We haven't been talking about on-throttle behaviour since well before I joined in.
In article , Yippee writes
ABS isn't required for help in those conditions. Intelligence and/or common sense are - don't drive like an idiot, and in the conditions above, don't drive at all if possible and if you have to, then drive extremely cautiously.
In article , R. N. Robinson writes
Did this like the ones on my Fiat 131s? They have an adjuster valve dependent upon the gap between the rear underside of the car body and the rear axle. The bigger the gap the less brake fluid pressure made it to the rear brakes. This also meant that if you have a lot of weight in the back the rear brakes do more work.
R. N. Robinson ( snipped-for-privacy@frumiousbandersnatch.freeserve.co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :
I'm always amazed how few cars actually have load-proportioning valves on the back suspension. Nothing bar cheapskatedness.
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