Should "good" tires be rotated to the front?

With those stopping distances I would not want to be in front of it if it had new tyres!

 

Sorry, normally I would. But most of my posts exceed the standard length.

Once in a while I throw a short one in just to balance out.

 

Why would somebody seek to replace tires after drifting into a snowbank? That could get really expensive.

 

You should never have 2 good tires and two bad tires, if you rotate the tires as you should. That is the idea behind rotating, spread out the wear evenly.

I believe the recomendation now a days is to always put the best two tires, if they are different, on the rear of the car - regardless of the drive wheels.

And if you are truely concerned about in snow traction, and it is something you deal with on a regular basis, you would be far better served by a set of snow tires all around. There is a very BIG difference

Worn tires are a danger to you and your family, as well as everyone who shares the road with you. This is especially true of driving in the rain and snow. I'd be really pissed if my kid got hurt in an accident because you slid out on worn out tires and hit my car or one of my kids on a bike. Many states have a minimum legal tread depth requirement, and if you have less you have potential fines to pay; or if in an accident it can up your liability - as it should.

There are always tires on sale at any number of places, Costco right now has a $70 rebate for buying 4 tires.

 

You could also have more Prii with front end damage than any other damage for multiple other reasons than just worn front tires.

1) Most accident damage to all cars overall is to the front of cars, Prius or not

2) The Prius because it seeks efficiency has small tires with small contact patches, all other things being the same, smaller contact patch means longer braking distance.

3) Because of its weight with the batteries the Prius is a realtively heavy car for its footprint, this would excasbate #2 above.

4) It is very likely that more Prius drivers than any other car try to hypermile by over inflating their tires to eeeekk out a few extra MPG, this is also going to reduce grip, which will increase stopping distance.

 

... but I now have State Patrol documentation that my Prius, hypermiled with fully (not over) inflated tires, can stop better than a certain VW Passat.

Of course, all other things were not the same. The Prius was carrying two baby boomers, the Passat was carrying a high school volleyball squad.

(This was a three car chain reaction. If the Prius really had a long stopping distance, it would have been a four or five car chain.)

 

Huh?

 

quote from automobile association ireland

""""New tyres to the front or rear?

Check the handbook first as some give vehicle specific advice.

Generally it's good practice to fit the best/newest tyres on the rear – in wet conditions, this favours understeer rather than oversteer. So if you have the front tyres renewed it's best to have the rear ones moved to the front and the new tyres fitted to the rear. Tyres with deep tread are less likely to puncture and it's more difficult to control a car with a damaged rear tyre."""

 

They do say Ireland is the 51st State.

 

For a front wheel drive car, if you want the best traction you mount the new tires on the front. If you want to be safer you mount the new tires on the rear. If you want to be smart you buy four new tires.

Tom

 

That used to be the recomendation, that is no longer the case.

very true

 

The basic reason for that is if one end has much better traction than the other end, the end with the best traction will end up in the rear during a hard stop on a wet surface. If the end with the best traction was the front, it will become the rear. Generally not a good thing.

 

Unless you want to go in the other direction. It's great for fast U turns. I've made a few of those in the snow over the years, and I don't recommend it.

Tom