No no--I'm not saying that you have to rotate now. I'm simply saying that by the time you need to rotate (after 5,000 miles), you would expect to have *some* level of feathering that's already taken place. That wear that is related to the direction of rotation is a big reason for the cross rotation, after all. So my point was that there will be a point in time somewhere between 0 and 5,000 miles when you should begin seeing this feathering *begin* to occur. It will slowly get deeper as time goes on, but probably won't be very severe. And it's probably only on the front where you're seeing this feathering.
So in 3,000 more miles, you rotate. The fronts get crossed to the back and you move the rears forward. Those fronts that feathered are now on the drive axle with no toe, so the feathering should remain unaffected for the most part. Then by the next rotation, the slightly-feathered rears will now move forward, so they're back on the front. But they're on the opposite side from where they began. So the feathering pattern will tend to wear in the "other direction" here, which will somewhat reverse the current pattern to near zero (smooth), then back into the other direction. But by that time, it'll be time to rotate again. So I believe all to be well here.
But you have to watch them on the rotations, if you have the shop do it. I've seen it so many times...they don't often follow the owner's manual, so you get tires that just get swapped front to back without getting swapped side to side. Or maybe the side to side swap only happens every second or third rotation. So you never get a consistent wear pattern unless you also have a consistent rotation pattern.
This is why I do my own tire rotations, even though the retailers offer free rotation. I'd much rather spend an hour in the garage knowing it was done right than spend an hour in a waiting room watching someone else work on my car, watching to make sure they do it right, and then having to go to the clerk if they've not.
