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Replacing your tires 

Aside from obvious failures such as a blow-out or an irreparable flat , how do you know when it’s time to replace the tires on your vehicle?

The answer is simpler than you may think thanks to an industry standard known as “wear bars.” Deep within the tread of every tire is a small ridge molded into the tire to indicate when that tire has reached its useful limit. The “bars” are located in several places around each tire and are aligned to create a line across the tire tread. An old tire trick involves using a penny. Hold the penny with Lincoln’s head facing down and toward you. Insert it into a worn area of the tread. If you can see all of the president’s head, the tires are worn out. Tires are officially worn out when the tread depth reaches 1/16th of an inch.

It is always best to replace all four tires at once. It ensures that the vehicle will ride and handle as it was designed for optimum safety and comfort - this is especially important if your vehicle is all-wheel drive. Traction control and computerized all wheel drive systems rely on all of the tires being exactly the same size and rotate at exactly the same speed. On a typical front or rear wheel drive vehicle you should at least replace your tires in pairs.

If you buy a new pair of tires the next question is where to have them installed. Old school logic had always professed installing the better tires on the front. Logically, the front tires handle the weight of the engine, steer, and provide most of the braking. This made good sense until engineers at Michelin proved that logical is not always practical. At their proving grounds Michelin demonstrated how having the better tires on the rear of a vehicle – either front or rear wheel drive – reduced hydroplaning and consequential oversteer caused by the rear tires losing traction. Hydroplaning is a condition that occurs when a tire cannot channel away the water beneath it and therefore loses contact with road by literally riding on a film of water.

Another thing to keep in mind is that all tires have a break-in period. Tires perform best after the first 500 miles of service. This is due to the use of various chemicals necessary during the manufacturing process that wear away after 500 miles or so.

The tire industry is extremely competitive so be sure to shop around before buying. Keep in mind that every tire manufacturer has several models of tires to choose from and then several variations of each model so be sure your comparing apples to apples.

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The goal of this site is to help you understand more about the entire car ownership experience.  You will find nothing to buy here except occasional items from my personal troves.  Our goal is to make you a well informed consumer of the second most expensive investment you may ever make in life - your car!  Your feedback and questions are welcome.  Check out Tips of the Trade for  common car questions.  You will find general information relative to various makes and models. We are first-class maniacal car enthusiasts who love high-tech as well as old school. For our purpose GM simply stands for General Mechanics - that's what we do, what we know and what we share!

 

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 This site was last updated 08/30/10