Rotating drive tires.

Sounds like you do the same as me. Every other tire change, you end up with 4 brand new and 4 around 75%. I didn't wanna be the first to mention it and be labeled a cheapskate. Lol.

 

Everyone already knows I’m a cheapskate, Proud of it too. Lol

 

I prefer to think of it as creative financing.

 

By a tread depth gauge. Rotate the lowest tread depth out on both sides with the higher tread depth. Do the math on your findings with tread depth gauge. It’s not rocket science and you are over thinking

 

I’ve “X” mine every time. All with good wear. Some tires will cup a little when you cross them like an “X” it straightens them out. I’ve been doing this for 36 years and all has been good. But what do I know....maybe @PE_Trans can give you some back up documentation. That’s how he rolls.

 

What’s so hard about this?

 

Our genius mechanic doesn't believe in rotating drive tires, or even buying good drive tires. He gets whatever is cheapest, in order to keep shop costs appearing low, in order to get a bigger bonus at year end.

Case in point would be the stunt he pulled with my drive tires.

Because of what we do, drive tires don't usually last more than 150k on a good set of Michelins. About two years ago, tire salesman pitched a set of Uniroyal RD30 drive tires. Price was really cheap. So genius (the mechanic) was all over them. Driver that got the first set hated them with a passion. And so did everyone else that got a set.

At the time, I had Bridgestone DR 444 drives, and I loved them. I was also doing a lot of off road work, in mud all the time. Truck was due for tires, and genius throws them Uniroyals on. I was a bit agitated, losing my Bridgestones that served me so well. But what the heck, I don't pay the bill. Well, I grew to love them.

Meanwhile, genius gets talked into General tires that are a poorly attempted knock off of the DR444's. I looked at them and swore on my life is never have them on my truck. This was confirmed one night when I had the spare truck with said Generals on. They were like having racing slicks. And I got stuck. That confirmed that I hated Generals.

My truck comes due for tires, and it became a two month long battle over tires. Genius insisted on Generals, I insisted on the Uniroyals. Neither of us would budge. His argument was the Generals were $20 a piece cheaper. $160 total difference. My argument was the Uniroyals were better suited for what I was doing, cost be dammed. I took it to the boss. He sided with me.

Needless to say, genius was not happy. So, I figured he'd retaliate somehow. I ran 40k miles, everything was great. Then he rotates the tires after a heated argument over why it's a good idea to rotate tires regularly. After he did this, I noticed the tires seemed low on air one night. So I check the pressure and found 50psi in all the drive tires. I'm 80k and up when loaded. Not a place for under inflated tires. I aired them up to 120psi, and they're fine. He got chewed out by the boss later on. Now, only the boss or myself touch my tires.

 

I have never in my life time caused drive tires to be rotated. Replaced yes but rotated? Never. If the mechanic rotated them in the shop I usually did not notice because all the tires were very consistent in wear.

 

Last season my haul route consisted of making a very hard right turn 14 times a day fully loaded with obviously my lift axle up. You should see the hell that played on driver side rear tires. Case in point, if you run local and make a lot of turns, you will be rotating tires often to keep them all at near equal heights