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Does this make as much sense for front wheel drive cars? Both of my FWD cars get front tires to wear more, and if I wanted to keep the better tread on the back,
by necovek 6y ago
Does this make as much sense for front wheel drive cars? Both of my FWD cars get front tires to wear more, and if I wanted to keep the better tread on the back, I'd never rotate them, and fronts would wear out much faster than the backs.
Not to mention that front wheels also have bigger brake rotors, so worse tread up front would also mean worse breaking.
- namdnay 6y agoDefinitely makes sense on FWD cars, common throughout Europe. And indeed we don’t rotate tyres here, as you point out, the front ones wear out faster anyway, so when they’re dead you move the back ones to the front and put new ones on the back Far better to lose some steering and braking power from worn front tires than to have your back flip out on you
- necovek 6y agoBut back wheels only rotate as a result of moving against the ground. Grip on the back tires seems most important for balanced braking. I am likely missing on some obvious basic physics here, but I wonder how does better grip in the back on a FWD car help reduce oversteer. Any pointers?
- namdnay 6y agoI guess the easiest way to see it in practice is in winter when FWD cars put snow chains on the front wheels. As long as they’re driving uphill it’s OK, but as soon as you drive down the mountain you’ll see cars spinning out of control. At the slightest turning circle, The inertia of the car will push the back out, and 99% of drivers don’t know how to deal with that situation- so they brake and try to turn harder, which makes things even worse. Obviously if everyone was used to driving RWD and countering oversteer , you wouldn’t need to put the best tires at the back. But the reflexes for the vast majority of drivers are to brake of things get tricky (which is perfectly fine for normal FWd driving)