94 Intrepid - replacing just 2 tires?

I did not rotate my tires as I should have. I moved the worn front tires to
the rear about a year ago. Today I decided the rear tires needed to be
replaced. The front tires are still good.

I wanted the tire shop to replace the worn rear tires, and then move them to
the front. Because front tires wear faster, I wanted the new tires in front.

They refused to do it. They said they only install 2 new tires in the rear.
They handed me a Michelin brochure that stated that it was more stable in
wet conditions to have the tires with the most traction in the rear.

Screw 'em. I 'll rotate the good tires to the front myself. I would rather
have the tires with the most traction in front when I am driving on snow in
the mountains. I also would rather have the least worn tires in the front,
because the front tires are subject to faster wear.

 

Screw 'em. I 'll rotate the good tires to the front myself. I would
rather

What, you'd rather give natural selection an unfettered path?

--Geoff

 

An idiot counterperson at a Discount Tire fed me the same line and
treated me like I didn't have a clue when I insisted on what I wanted
done to MY car. I've never set foot back in that particular store again,
nor will I. I went to another Discount Tire where I was treated like an
intelligent car owner and they happily did what I wanted instead of
feeding me a line of BS they learned in "training" somewhere.

To their credit, the reasoning isn't totally invalid for some cars- they
don't want to create a car prone to oversteer by putting tires with less
traction on the back. The fatal flaw in their argument is that
front-drive cars are so HEAVILY prone to understeer already that putting
the more worn tires on the back actually helps balance the car's
handling. However, it also makes the tires last longer and they don't
get to sell as many.

 

An idiot counterperson at a Discount Tire fed me the same line and

This is a good point. They *should* do what you want; their legal team has
advised them otherwise.

Right...

The fatal flaw in their argument is that

Sorry, gotta disagree. In snowy climes, having the worn tires on the back
creates spinout accidents, even when travelling in a straight line. It
happened this past winter to my dad in his Sebring; it happened to me about
9 years ago in my Duster. Both times the car was steered straight ahead and
hit a slicker-than-the-rest-of-the-road spot, and both times there was a
significant disparity between the amount of tread front to rear. You hear
about these things happening on the traffic reports in the wintertime here
virtually every snowy day.

Re: 'balanced handling': with FWD, I always want the front end to break
loose *first*. I've played around quite a bit in snow with lift-throttle
oversteer in the Intrepid (leave the AutoSchtick in 1st, hammer the gas, cut
the wheel, cut the throttle) and it's *extremely* hard to catch the rear end
once it starts coming around. You can do it, but you're usually almost to
180 degrees before you do. That's real low-speed stuff, too; no more than
about 15 MPH. Higher speeds? I spin out.

Conversely, unless I'm really in a lot of trouble, I don't have any problem
getting a hand on things if it starts to push, however.

In perfectly dry conditions, having the worn tires on the back probably
doesn't matter one way or the other until you're really pushing the limits
of adhesion; wet or icy/snowy conditions, it's a snake that could bite you
anytime with little warning. BTDT.

--Geoff

 

This is Central Texas. Snow is not an issue.

I don't think you could POSSIBLY put slick enough tires on the back
that this wouldn't be the case with most FWD cars. They are hugely
biased toward understeer. Heck, most REAR-drive passenger cars are
heavily biased toward understeer! If I had a wreck after visiting
Discount Tire, I could more defensibly sue them for putting the worn
tires on the front and giving me a car that understeers so badly I
couldn't turn it than I could claim they caused oversteer by putting
worn tires on the back. Its just not possible.

They are flat-out doing the WRONG thing for 90% of the cars on the road.

 

Sorry, gotta disagree. In snowy climes, having the worn tires on the
back

We've gotta get you up here in the wintertime sometime, Steve. Pick a
January for NAIAS, and we'll go sledding down I-94, K?

I think this is the source of this sort of idiocy: every business is
national now, and they implement one-size-fits-all policies. Down there I
'spect there's a lot of subtle differences--some not so subtle--that have an
impact. Do y'all (a little Texas talk ;-)) get torrential downpours
frequently, or is your climate too dry? In other words, is hydroplaning a
common problem?

I agree with your assessment that it's wrong for 90% of the cars...in
non-snowy climates. Maybe 99%.

I won't go so far as to say that putting the worn tires in the rear
*guarantees* a spinout in icy conditions, but I'd be willing to bet you that
90% of the spinouts that happen have a tire-related cause, and a significant
(> 50%) amount of the cause is worn rear tires. I'm guessing, pulling
numbers out of my butt, but these things happen enough around here that you
typically get to see a lot of spinouts during a snowstorm. In my case and
my dad's it was *clearly* because of the rear tires. No doubt about it.

You know, for as throttle-happy, herky-jerky 'big city' as I drive, I guess
I'm pretty blessed that I've really only _unintentionally_ lost control of a
vehicle once in what...19 years on the road? And it was the damn back
tires.

--Geoff

 

I'm allergic to cold weather. It makes me break out in a bad mood

Definitely. Typical rain patterns here are none for months and then 6
inches in a day.

But let me be clear, we're talking about all 4 tires that are still
PERFECTLY safe to drive on. The yahoos just want to put the new ones on
the back of FWD cars because they know that it will wear the old ones
out much faster, resulting in another sale for them.