Wheel Rotation - Mileage or Measurement Based?
 

Curious if anyone has taken a measurement (tire tread depth) approach instead of mileage to determine when a rotation is warranted. If so, please share your experience and whether it offers an extended rotation cycle (with and without RFTs).

Thanks.

I've never even heard of anyone doing that. Mileage has always been my guide combined w/ convenience and coordination w/ other routine maintenance. Depending on the vehicle, my personal preference has been rotating tires every oil change on 10k mile oil changes or every other oil change at 7k mi changes. On my Mini I rotate them myself every 6-7k miles. I suppose your approach might make sense if you're trying to squeeze every last bit of cost efficiency in a fleet setting but otherwise I'm not certain.

Just do it on a regular short mileage schedule. This will be best in the long run.

Makes sense to do it wear related, just seems like a lot of extra effort. My 5000 miles is a lot different wear on front tires than my wife's driving as an example.

My tire rotations are based on mileage (10k), always have been. Never had any issues with odd/excessive wear.

It's much easier to do tire rotations on tire mileage, wear on each tire will be different front to rear and with over or under inflation, so what criteria do you use to rotate if one or two tires are worn more? Do you change the rotation pattern to adjust for wear?

If you rotate tire early there is no harm and the goal of rotation is to even out tire use and wear as much as can be. In the end keeping each tire relatively even wearing can be difficult since the demands on the fronts are much greater than the rears by a factor of two.

When to check tire tread depth-
https://blog.tirerack.com/blog/alexs...-your-progress

When rotating examine each tire for uneven wear and use tread depth as a measure to determine if air pressures need to be changed or an alignment problem is responsible.

Something will always throw off your plans. Like a flat tire that can't be repaired.

In 50 plus years of driving, I've never heard of 'wear based tire rotation". A ruler stuck between treads for measurement? I have always rotated tires with every other oil change and have never had a single tire wear out prematurely (compared to other three).

Simple enough to find and use-

I wouldn't wait to see tires wearing down to an exact level to determine if it is time to rotate. Mileage alone should be sufficient to cause some wear assuming tire pressures have been kept to a good range which is essential in any case.

I change my oil once a year due to low mileage so at least once yearly rotation seems workable, different for each case

With my short tracking driving experience I leant that the best way is to rely on your own intuition as you are one who only know your own usage. Trust your own judgement. There is no replacement for attention to details. Just inspect the thread depth and wear pattern of all 4 tyres WRT the baseline that is when they were new against whatever mileage they seen. Remember rotation is all about to even out the wear and tear - spreading the pain :grin: for all the tyres. It is not rocket science or exoteric engineering some like you to think. :roll:

I don't own one of those fancy thread depth gauge. My eyeballs are good enough for my needs.