Do I smell a troll?
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Stevie
Lakland 44-02 Sunburst
Yamaha YTS-23
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I don't know about curious, but I think your claim is spurious.
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No trolls here. And the question posed was"do I have a claim against Skoda" so you have said no, so why the sarcasm?
Skoda seem not to care about problems anyway. Three months after the car was bought it was off the road for five weeks having it's engine rebuilt "not my fault " in case any wise man cares to take note they made a total mess up of the situation So I am ot confident about the quality of their product.
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Apollogies for the scarcasim on this board.
It comes across as if you think Skoda should replace your tires for you because they are worn out. and you think you have the right to claim the cost of the tires back?
If that is the case you have no claim, and a lot of people find it amusing someone should assume that they should have a claim for tires wearing out after 30,000 miles.
I am puzzled about this swaping buissiness though. Are you saying that you want to swap the tires around, but the the garage wants to replace all your tires, so costing you more money?
Just an aside. I recently had my cambelt on the clio changed and it is sometimes recomended you change the water pump as well. I neglected to tell the garage that I wanted them to replace the water pump whilst getting the cambelt changed. I was dissapointed when my invoice arrived and they did not charge me for a water pump (assume they did'nt change it). The thing is I don't think I would have a claim against the garage if my water pump broke and destroyed the engine.
The moral of the story is that if you had told the garage to swap your tires and only use two new tires you would expect them to do just that. If you told the garage you wanted a new set of tires they will most likely put 4 new tires on.
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Torque means nothing without RPM
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Thanks mk124.
The reason I was a bit miffed was that I enquired from both the AA and RAC about changing wheels to maximise the useful life of my tyres both said yes it should be done yet everybody else says no. However1
ps I notice you spell tyres as tires are you in the UK?
Regards
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All I can say is that (with a front wheel drive car) I wish I could make my front tyres last 30000.
(Forum name formerly "L'escargot by name but not by nature"!)
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L\'escargot.
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A main dealer will follow the service schedule - which you should have in your owners manual.
Unless swapping tyres is on the schedule which I very much doubt, there is no responsibility on the dealers to swap tyres of their own accord. Im sure if you asked them to they would, but its not their place to do work not on the schedule.
Maybe you should take a little responsibilty for your car and think about these things as you go along. Blaming the dealers for this is rather petty and the suggestion that they are at all at fault is laughable. I get 100,000 out of my tyres - maybe you should slow down!
100000 miles I do not believe it.
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The only result of swapping tyres round is to spread the wear around all four. That means you have to buy four new tyres infrequently, or two at half the interval.
That might make sense if you were planning to sell the car. Otherwise, the total rate of tyre erosion, adding together that on all four wheels, is bound to be the same however much you swap them round.
The only point in swapping them is if for some reason they don't wear evenly across the tread, eg if your car suffers from extreme camber wear. Then it would make sense to change the tyre to a position with a converse wear regime, so that you don't wear one side right down but still have tread left on the other. But that would normally indicate an alignment fault.
PS tyres used to be spelled tires in the UK when they were metal rims round cartwheels or train wheels. When cars came in for some reason the y spelling came in too. There was a big fuss in the Times in about 1900 about the new un-British spelling "tyres".
PPS is Charla short for charlatan by any chance? just thought I'd ask the obvious question.
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There was a big fuss in the Times in about 1900 about the new un-British spelling "tyres".
Crikey Cliff, even I'm not old enough to remember that!
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L\'escargot.
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Crikey Cliff, even I'm not old enough to remember that! --
I can even remember when people used to say things like "crikey" !
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I can even remember when people used to say things like "crikey" !
Crumbs!
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L\'escargot.
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If any of the wheels have a significant camber angle then swapping the wheels front to rear may well help to give a more even wear across the width of the tread and hence prolong (slightly) the life of the tyre. If the wheels aren't swapped, one side of the tyre could become worn out whilst the other side still had adequate tread remaining. However, if a wheel has a pronounced camber angle and hence a large difference in wear rate from one side of the tyre to the other (for example as per the front wheels of early Hillman Imps) then swapping wheels from a high camber situation to a low camber situation can result in the tyre having a pronounced uneven contact pressure on the road from one side of the tyre to the other and this can be dangerous. Believe me, I've been there!
I personally prefer to renew tyres two at a time (the driven tyres usually wear faster than the other two) rather than try to get all four tyres to need renewing at the same time. I believe that swapping tyres side to side is often not recommended because of adverse effects that arise from altering the direction of rotation.
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L\'escargot.
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If I appear to have merely repeated what Cliff Pope has said it's because Cliff was quicker off the mark. Let's face it, I am L'escargot!
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L\'escargot.
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Yorkshire born and bred, but cannot spell, use grammer, and my sentence construction is apparently Rumsfeldian at times, according to some people on this board.
Tires or Tyres? It should be tyres I feel. It was a post late in the day, I was just tyred (sorry).
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Torque means nothing without RPM
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I thoought some of the responses to the original question were a bit sarcastic and 'holier than thou' to be honest. Its not an unreasonable question from someone if they don't have much technical knowledge of cars.
FWIW, I don't think any service schedules now include tyre rotation (some used to up until a few years back). So the dealer was not wrong in not doing it.
However many tyre manufacturers DO recommend rotation. As a general rule I believe in tyre rotation, for the following reasons:
1. Some cars (esp. RWD like Mercedes C-class) have quite a bit of toe-in on the rear wheels, this produces feathering of the tread block and eventually the tyre becomes noisy and pruduces a whining noise. Rotation helps prevent this.
2. Many FWD cars are 'hard' on the front tyres but very 'easy' on the rear tyres. If the car only does a modest mileage then, by changing only in pairs, you can end up with different types of tyres on the car (because the original brand/type is now obsolete). I prefer to have the tyres wear evenly and then replace with a set of four of exactly the same type. Rotation helps prevent the situation when you end up with a pair of old tyres on the car. Tyres weaken with age (UV makes the rubber go brittle and I find the tread seems to hardern with age and give less grip).
3. Some 4WD systems (e.g. Mercedes) are very sensitive about tyre diameter and will flag a fault if there is more than a few mm difference. Any 4WD car works best when all tyres have the same level of grip.
Obviously if the tyres are directional then full rotation is not possible.
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Your forgiven.
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In terms of tyre longevity, I was VERY surprised that the factory-fit Conti SportContacts on my Passat 130 lasted 33,000 miles (front) and 45,000 (rear).
It's a big heavy bus of a thing, I always switch the TCS off and use the performance to the full. The Contis were a bit noisy but they last and last.
The replacement Vredesteins on the front are shot after 17K miles, which is more like it ...
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If the service is carried out by a Skoda dealer all the items shown in the service record book should be done for the "Service Price" If you want anything extra it must be requested and paid for as an extra!
Until a few years ago I owned a small franchised dealership and we NEVER swapped tyres around unless requested by the car's owner.. As said before, if you do this there's a good chance that all tyres will need replacing at the same time with consequential severe negative cash flow!
My Skoda Fabia, 1.9tdi ,owned from new and having covered 105,000 km, has only needed two front tyres- the rear ones are only about 50% worn even now and the fronts still have loads of tread left.
Roger. (Costa del Sol, España)
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I'm intrigued Aprilia of all people recommends tyre rotation. The last time I read up on this, it was very much frowned upon, for the following reason that convinced me:
In general, front tyres wear more rapidly than rear tyres. Front tyres therefore have less grip. The car is therefore inclined to understeer.
Swap the wheels over in order to put more wear onto the rear tyres, and the car's handling characteristics will change and it will oversteer compared to its normal set up, thus confusing the driver.
Therefore, when the front tyres do eventually wear out, you should move the rear tyres to the front, and put the new ones on the rear - in order to maintain the understeering tendency of the motor.
I think OP came in for a lot of flack from the suggestion that the car manufacturer - i.e. other marque owners, or shareholders (i.e. pensioners) should pay for his replacement tyres. That came over as arrogant selfishness, not stupidity.
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I think OP came in for a lot of flack from the suggestion that the car manufacturer - i.e. other marque owners, or shareholders (i.e. pensioners) should pay for his replacement tyres.
Blimey, didn't realise he was out to hammer the poor old pensioners and get them to choke up for his new tyres - didn't spot that one.. ;-)
I think tyre rotation is a good thing, but you have to do it fairly frequently (e.g. every 6000 miles) - that way the wear is quite uniform and so all tyres would have more or less equal grip and keep the handling balanced. When they all get low you put on a new set and, again, the handling is balanced. Unless you have something exotic then tyres are actually pretty cheap these days - hardly a major financial blow.
Most tyre manufacturers still recommend tyre rotation, I have a little data book on my desk which is published by Michelin. I think its about 5 years old and they are strongly recommending rotation and describe the best way to do it. I think the move to very long service intervals (12,000 miles +) is what makes it difficult.
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Michelin take a different view nowadays, except in America, where they only have straight roads.... However, over here, they say "Motor insurance companies have warned that the popular habit of installing new tyres to the front wheels rather than the back could be potentially disastrous. Michelin has also said that using new tyres on the front of a vehicle and part worn at the back produces greater amounts of oversteer, and an increased chance that drivers will lose control. Part-worn tyres are also more prone to punctures, Stephen Dolby of Michelin told Fleet NewsNet, and that this was more dangerous at the rear as the back of the car was more likely to swing out." The same is true of emergency braking, said motor insurance companies. www.motorinsurance.co.uk/news/1067.html
And from the bouche du cheval, www.michelin.co.uk/uk/auto/auto_cons_bib_pqr_neuf....p
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Where have you found that Michelin say that tyres should not be rotated? They have some bendy roads in the US you know. I have my little booklet (France, 2001) says they should be rotated and I know Goodyear still recommend it.
The motor insurance article you quote is a bit strange and seems to be arguing against putting new tyres on the front and "part-worn" tyres on the back, which I would agree with. This seems to be an article warning against buying 'part-worns'. The whole point of tyre rotation (if done reasonably frequently) is that tyre wear is evened out and therefore all tyres have similar wear. Obviously if you let the fronts wear well down and swap barely worn rears onto the front then that would be bad practise and would indeed promote oversteer, but if there is only a mm or so average tread difference then I don't see a problem. Chassis designers work on the assumption that grip is much the same at all four corners; can't see what is wrong with reasonably frequent rotation and then replace the full set and I will keep doing it. I know for a fact that some car manufacturers recommend it (Hyundai, Subaru) and its essential with Merc 4WD otherwise you can severly upset the system (been there and got the T-shirt on that one!!).
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While I can see the theoretical basis of the Michelin article I'd be shocked if the grip of my Xantia's say 40% worn rears were so far below those of the new fronts as to affect handling in any but the most marginal of circumstances. Angels dancing on the head of apin?
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I subscribe to the change everything when the front were school of thought. If you want anything more than a standard service ie check belts, clean and check brakes, check air filter , change oil and filter and top up and check fluid levels then you need to ask for it.
If you are particularly botherd then rotate the tyres yourself, all you need is a good troley jack, a whel wrench and a tourq wrench.
Imo corect tyre presures and driving tequniuqe are more significant re tyre wear than rotation.
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