Tire Rotation Wall Chart

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qdeezie

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I realize this may be a bit of an asinine question to ask, but I have been on Google for awhile trying to find a large image of a tire rotation chart that I can print out and put on the wall in my garage.

All I am coming up with are itty bitty images and I know they will get blurry if I try to enlarge them.

I could get on Visio and put a generic chart together, but figured that something should already exist.

To be honest, if there was a nice, polished tire rotation wall chart that was being sold somewhere online or locally, I would be interested in paying for it if it looks good.

Since I own both FWD and RWD vehicles, it's rather easy to get confused with the rotation patterns and I find myself looking it up online every time I rotate tires just to reassure myself that I'm going with the right pattern.

Does anyone know of anything like this or do I just need to go with the aformentioned idea in Visio?
 
"Don't cross the drive tires." Boom. You're covered for FWD, RWD, and 4WD. Not sure why people always get confused.
 
Originally Posted By: Ethan1
"Don't cross the drive tires." Boom. You're covered for FWD, RWD, and 4WD. Not sure why people always get confused.


This is what I follow, but do you or anyone know why it is? Because they WILL be crossed on the subsequent rotation. Is it just to reduce the frequency of crossing, or another reason?
 
Originally Posted By: Quattro Pete
How big does it really need to be?
Something as simple as a 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper that I can tape to the wall with painter's tape is literally good enough for me.

Originally Posted By: Quattro Pete
http://automotive.kendatire.com/media/1168/tire_rotation_guide.jpg?mode=pad&width=1200
I'll take a look at this and see if it works for me. I appreciate this!

Originally Posted By: Quattro Pete
Fyi, i just do front to back. No chart needed.
I used to do this back in the day. I figured I'd step it up a bit to see if I could squeeze a bit more mileage out of my tires. Honestly, I don't have any proof as to whether or not it has made a difference.
 
Originally Posted By: Ethan1
"Don't cross the drive tires." Boom. You're covered for FWD, RWD, and 4WD. Not sure why people always get confused.
I appreciate this. Had it been explained this way to me years ago, it would have made life a lot easier with regards to rotating tires. I read your post and thought about it for a second and then the light bulb came on. This is very sound advice.
 
Originally Posted By: Oro_O
Originally Posted By: Ethan1
"Don't cross the drive tires." Boom. You're covered for FWD, RWD, and 4WD. Not sure why people always get confused.


This is what I follow, but do you or anyone know why it is? Because they WILL be crossed on the subsequent rotation. Is it just to reduce the frequency of crossing, or another reason?


I don't know why it's done that way tbh
 
qdeezie - the only reason to cross rotate tires is to fix the feathering that happens over time. When you just go front to back the tires continue rolling into the same toe as before, whereas a cross allows them to toe-against the pattern that was worn into them. Adter 7-10K miles they develop a new pattern and smooth out nicely. I think you will be pleased.
 
Originally Posted By: Ethan1
Originally Posted By: Oro_O
Originally Posted By: Ethan1
"Don't cross the drive tires." Boom. You're covered for FWD, RWD, and 4WD. Not sure why people always get confused.


This is what I follow, but do you or anyone know why it is? Because they WILL be crossed on the subsequent rotation. Is it just to reduce the frequency of crossing, or another reason?


I don't know why it's done that way tbh


The recommendation to not cross the drive tires is because the drive tires often experience some heel-and-toe wear that develops due to the forces involved in pulling or pushing the vehicle. It can make for a noisy ride when you cross a tire with this type of wear, so the recommendation is to keep it on the same side of the vehicle so that the heel-and-toe wear has a chance to wear in just a little bit before it's eventually crossed to the other side.

Having just said that, I personally don't follow this, and play every tire rotation by ear...well, by eye, actually. Our vehicles, having relatively close to 50/50 weight distribution (for FWD-based platforms, anyway) and having active AWD systems that drive all four tires during most acceleration situations, tend to wear the front and rear tires pretty evenly. They DO feather the edges of the tread, though, due to camber and toe settings. At each oil change, I look at the wear patterns and tread depths. If the edges of the tread have some feathering, I'll flip the tires side-to-side. But of the tread depth difference between the front and rears is 1/32" or less, I don't bother to also swap the fronts and the rears. A simple side-to-side rotation is far easier and faster. If the tires haven't really feathered yet at the time of the oil change, I don't bother to rotate them.

I guess that's a long way of saying that I don't personally have a rotation schedule, nor do I have a consistent rotation pattern. I do rotations only as needed, and the type of rotation I do is based only on the wear patterns and tread depths I'm seeing at that time.
 
To combat heal-toe wear, the tires MUST rotate in the opposite direction. 'Never crossing the drive tires' is a good way to make sure you develop noisy heal-toe wear. Not recommended.

I'm with Hokiefyd...look at your tires and determine the best position. It's a good idea to mark them (FR, FL, RR, RL) and keep them in pairs, though, so that the outer diameters on each axle are the same.

The procedure is simple:
1) measure tread depth of all four tires - you should find that your pairs are the same depth of FR = depth of FL and depth of RR = depth of RL
2) put the tires with the deepest NS on the end of the car that tends to wear fastest
3) to determine which side of the car to place the tires, look for heal-toe wear on the tread blocks. The trailing edge of the block will be worn more than the leading edge. To combat the heal-toe wear, you want the edge of the block that is sticking up the most to become the trailing edge in normal rotation.

Note that sometimes it's easier to feel heal-toe wear than to see it. Take your hand and rub it over the tire in the direction that it rotates and in the opposite. You will be able to feel the 'sharp' leading edges of the blocks in one direction and it will feel much 'smoother' when you run your hand in the opposite direction.


When in doubt, perform a simple "X" rotation. FR --> RL, FL --> RR, RR --> FL, and RL --> FR
 
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