Is it just BMW that does not recommend tire rotation?

Do any other manufacturers other than BMW not recommend tire rotation?

From the BMW shop manual:

Tire rotation The tread wear patterns at the front end differ from those at the rear - the actual patterns will vary according to individual driving conditions. In the interests of safety and maintaining optimal handling characteristics, BMW does not recommend tire rotation.

If a proposed interaxle rotation of tires is based on economic considerations, one should consider whether the costs for the rotation are likely to be recaptured by any increase in the service life of the tires that might be realized. In principle, interaxle rotation must be performed in short intervals, with a maximum of 3,000 miles (5,000 km). Consult your BMW center for more information.

Should you decide to rotate the tires, it is essential to comply with the following: Rotate tires on the same side only, since braking characteristics and road grip could otherwise be adversely affected. Following rotation, the tire inflation pressure should always be corrected. If different tire sizes are mounted on the front and rear axles (refer to page 130), the wheels may not be rotated from one axle to the other.

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Reply to
Shaft Drive
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The info you provided sounds like they might be referring to purpose-built front and rear tires of the same size. Some high-end BMWs have larger tires on the rear axle.

Pirelli's PZero system includes a directional tire for the front, and an asymmetric tire for the rear. I believe they're optimized for RWD cars.

Reply to
y_p_w

The info is the same in virtually all BMW owner manuals, for all tire combinations including same-size front/rear. For instance, my '01 330xi (same size all round - has to be!) recommends against it. So does the manual for my '91 E34 525i.

The front tires tend to wear asymmetrically; more wear on the outside/outboard edges than in the center and inside edge. This happens *even if* the car is perfectly aligned.

Floyd

Reply to
fbloogyudsr

Some tyre can only rotate in one direction, so these can't be turned around on the rim and could only be swapped between the front and back on the same side and then only if the tyres are the same size (otherwise you will go round in circles!). So you may not be able to swap any tyres on some models / wheels.

Generally speaking rear tyres tend to wear in the middle, especially if you do a lot of motorway work whereas the fronts tend to wear at the edge (especially outside - so some tyres can be turned or rim swapped to even this wear up). As it happens all my 7 series have had standard tyres which are all the same size, so when the fronts wear down, I move the rears to the front and put new tyres on the rear.

Reply to
R. Mark Clayton

Well, I can think of several cars right off the top of my head (Dodge Viper, for one) where there is a different configuration tire for each corner of the car, and so rotation isn't even possible. ANY car that uses unidirectional tires AND different size tires front and rear falls into that category.

Reply to
Steve

Some, like both of my Jeep owners manuals also recommend only front to back rotation with the spare going to the main drive wheel, the RR and the RF going to the spare.

Mike

86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's

Shaft Drive wrote:

Reply to
Mike Romain

Vettes - 97 & up - different size wheels on the front and back. tires are directional, so rotating isn't possible without dismounting the tires. Don't own one, so can't tell you what the manual says, but if I owned one I wouldn't rotate the tires.

Some 80's Camaros had wheels with different offset for front and rear with directional tires, so same problem.

For my 01 Trans Am it recommends rotating front-rear on the same side.

I think the Acura NSX had a unique tire at each corner as well.

Reply to
ray

Tyre rotation hasn't made much sense since ever.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

I thought that was the operative principle behind automobiles, that the tires should rotate. Wouldn't they get flat spots otherwise?

-- Fred

Reply to
pltrgyst

I agree. So does BMW. Even for same size unidirectional tires on all four corners.

According to BMW, the only time tire rotation makes sense on a rear-wheel-drive performance vehicle is if you do it yourself every 3000 miles (before any wear becomes too great to affect handling).

On rear-wheel-drive performance automobiles, once you pass the 3000 mile mark, you start noticeably wearing the rears in the center and the fronts on the side. At this 3000-mile point-of-no-return, adverse handling will occur if you rotate.

If you do rotate within the 3000 mile limit, make sure you readjust the pressure differential between the rears and the front or you'll have other handling problems you didn't bargain for.

Also, if you do rotate, use any pattern you like (crossing sides at random, using the fifth tire, changing rotation direction, etc). Studies have shown that none of these rotation patterns adversly affect anything and none are any better than any other rotation pattern. Again, if you pass the 3000 mile point of no return, stop rotating for the life of those tires (should get you at least 30,000 miles depending on how aggressively you drive).

If you have a front-wheel-drive econobox (all fwd cars are compromises for the sake of costs), things might be different though I've no experience with low-performance fwd cars.

Reply to
Thomas & Sons Cycle Shop

Tyre rotation seems to be a mainly American thing, no one else ever really mentions or uses it, as far as I've seen. Any particular reason for this?

"Thomas & Sons Cycle Shop" wrote in message news:4ljhe.2639$ snipped-for-privacy@newssvr19.news.prodigy.com...

Reply to
zerouali

Dunno. The last UK car driver's handbook I can find (and I've got a fair old collection) where tyre rotation - including spare - is recommended dates from the mid '50s, when crossply tyres were the norm. And 3000 mile oil changes.;-)

Perhaps the US isn't as up to date as most think? ;-)

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Huh? We're at least 50% Japanese, whether Euro or American, japanese create all these headaches. My both Nissan and Oldsmobile had rotation in service manual as required

Reply to
Alotta Fagina

"zerouali" wrote

The main rationale is to maximize tire mileage/life. On a FWD car, the fronts always wear more and won't last as long as the rears. On a RWD car, the rears wear more. And the spare tire doesn't wear at all.

Floyd

Reply to
fbloogyudsr

SNIP

Forgive my ignorance but, in using the word 'unique' are saying that each tire is actually manufactured differently? And if so, how does one replace a single tire? Do you request a left rear, front right, etc...?

RichieP

Reply to
RichieP

"RichieP" wrote

That is exactly the case. The NSX (and many other high performance cars, including BMW's with different-sized front/rear sport packages) have uni-directional tires. That means that the tires can be on only one side (left/right) of the car. When, in addition, the tires at the front and rear are different sizes, that means that no tire can be used *EXCEPT* at the corner it is designed for. The NSX ('91-'94) has 205/50ZR15's front, 225/50ZR16 rear (IIRC), and the OEM tires (Yoko & Bridgestones) are uni-directional.

If you trash a tire, you should replace both on that axle if they have been worn much - say about 75% left. You do have to order the right one for that corner.

FloydR - used to have an NSX

Reply to
fbloogyudsr

Come on people, you can't be serious. Uni-directional tires can be used on either side of the car. You don't request a left or a right. You just need to make sure you mount the tire facing the right direction.

And the BMW recommendation has nothing to do with the tires being staggered. The recommendation is the same if the front and rear tires are the same.

Reply to
Marcio Watanabe

The idea is to have all tires wear approximately evenly, so that they all wear out at the same time. Then you can replace them with a matched set of new tires, rather than have two new tires and two partly worn old tires (or having to waste some of the tread life of the old not worn out tires).

Reply to
Timothy J. Lee

I think you should *RE-READ* my post. My *ENTIRE* post, especially the part you clipped.

Floyd

Reply to
fbloogyudsr

On both my E34 and E39, all tyres wore out pretty well at the same time without rotation. It of course depends on driving style and power of the vehicle. But with a 50/50 weight distribution it's what you'd expect, in theory.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

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