Poor tyre wear?

[Black263]

I've just had my first service on my Superb iv and have amber warnings for front tyre wear with 3.6mm remaining after 8900 miles.  (Rear tyres 5.6mm)

 

The dealer thinks this is quite reasonable but seems a very short tread life to me.  Tyre are Bridgestone Turanza T005.  Is this normal, or are the OEM tyres just rubbish for tread wear?

[ApertureS]

Depends on lots of things including how much weight, tyre pressures, where you drive, how you drive. Its hard to put a round figure on how long a tyre should last. 

[KenONeill]

1 hour ago, Black263 said:

3.6mm remaining after 8900 miles.

Is the tyre wear even across the tread width?

[SurreyJohn]

So are right and left same tread depth, (even if back has more tread), and is it even across width.

 

If yes, then probably due to coarse road surfaces.

If no, then get alignment and pressures checked

 

Might be sensible to get the wheels swapped around to even out the wear, then you will wear them all out about same time which makes it lot easier to change brand (or better still, change from summer tyres, to all season tyres).

The Bridgestone T005 is a summer touring tyre, but now you can buy specialist tyres for EVs.  If you run mainly in electric mode then might be worth looking at these.  They are better suited to the high starting torque of electric motors.

 

 

Edited 28 October, 2021 by SurreyJohn

[Danoid]

Mine is still on the originals from factory in 2016 with coming up to 37K miles.

 

Pirelli P7’s do seem to last a while it seems, but the outside is perishing a bit from lack of use in my ownership

[Black263]

Centre is 3.6.  Edges are 4.5 on both front tyres.  I asked the engineer if it was over-inflation and he said that it wasn't and was normal wear.  I think I'll skip rotating the tyres as I used to have Winter/Summer wheels and more recently Crossclimates.  I can't remember the last time I went through the Winter on Summer tyres.  (At least 20 years), so I'll just bin them before the end of Nov, and go Crossclimate 2.

[Penpusher]

14 minutes ago, Danoid said:

Mine is still on the originals from factory in 2016 with coming up to 37K miles.

 

Pirelli P7’s do seem to last a while it seems, but the outside is perishing a bit from lack of use in my ownership

I've still got the original Pirelli P7s on the rear and when I had the MOT carried out a month ago, I had an advisory that they're starting to perish.  There're OK for now, but if I go on any longer trips, especially if I go abroad, I'll replace them.

[nta16]

17 minutes ago, Black263 said:

Centre is 3.6.  Edges are 4.5 on both front tyres.  I asked the engineer if it was over-inflation and he said that it wasn't and was normal wear.

Really!?  What's the explanation to that then?

 

Even if they're run-flat tyres -

"Life span of Run Flat Tyres

The materials used to manufacture run flat tyres are similar or identical to conventional tyres, so their wear rates should be comparable. Keeping the correct air pressure in your tyres (no matter what type) is the best way to ensure a longer life from your tyres." - https://www.national.co.uk/information/run-flat-tyres

 

[KenONeill]

8 hours ago, Black263 said:

I asked the engineer if it was over-inflation and he said that it wasn't and was normal wear.

There I would disagree. This is a classic over-inflation wear pattern.

[MarkyG82]

Let's be generous and day they started with 8mm. Makes it about 16k miles total. That's not great but also not that bad either. Colleague of mine used to run toyos (as that's what he liked) on his fast Mondeo and thought 8k miles was normal. I'd expect cheaper tyres to get 15-20k and premium to get to 25k+. Michelin should be one of the best and my cross climates have done about 8k and at a guess are about 30% worn. Need to measure properly though.

[nta16]

Sorry but I'm going to disagree I'd expect cheaper tyres to last more miles, if they last otherwise.  A good tyre could easily be one that wears the tread fast, it depends on what the tyre is used for.  There are far too many variables, as ApertureS pointed out, to say how long a tyre might last.

 

As with vehicles, manufacturers of tyres might have very good and not in their range but it's doubtful that you can blanket their whole range as either.  Models change too so the No.1 tyre last year might be beaten by the competition this year and the last couple of years the compounds seem to have changed so what was an excellent tyre a couple of years ago now may have changed its characteristics.

 

Like a lot of things with cars there's also fashion to consider (not only the decades-old fashion of having over-large and over-wide wheels and tyres with very low (side) profiles there's also tread pattern fashion. 

 

Also there's seems to be a belief in absolute figures rather than nominal tyre dimensions, like 8mm tread depth when new, this isn't so it can vary.  Only recently I bought some tyres that started with only 6.5mm from new, which seemed to catch other purchases out and annoy some thinking the missing 1.5mm was part of the wear.

 

Also the wear on a tyre needn't necessarily be an even, linear wear over it's life.

 

3.6mm in the centre and 4.5mm at the edges, would that equate to 4mm had the wear been even over the width of the tyre, I don't know but the difference in those figures does seem odd to me and as KenONeill has put would normally suggest over-inflation.  Unless Black263 use the vehicle for regular serious street drag racing down at the supermarket car park.

 

Still be very interesting to hear the Technician's explanation of the tyre wear, not dismissing it.

 

Edited 29 October, 2021 by nta16

[MarkyG82]

Ok yeah there are far too many variables to consider. I was merely expressing my experience and that of some tyre reviews.

 

The 8mm was also an assumption as it's a rough figure where many tyres start. Going on a 6.5mm starting depth and an average 4mm remaining, the overall life could be over 23k miles. 

 

As for the life of tyres compared to brand/cost, I have found that cheaper tyres need to use softer compounds to achieve the same levels of grip afforded by a more premium model. This ends with them wearing quicker. 

 

Again this is my experience and only some of the evidence I use when selecting tyres.

[nta16]

I wasn't having a go at you, the 6.5mm is unusual usually 7-8mm I think, just a figure to show they're not all 8mm.  My thought was that cheaper tyres don't bother so much with grip going for mileage which some prefer.  Of course a cheaper tyre is actually more expensive if it doesn't do what you want and you have to replace it sooner.  Many tyres can craze and crack from lack of use and get splits, the really cheap ones I've seen have cracks at the bottom of the treads, date of manufacture just about 3 years, but very low mileage use on them.

 

Many people only know the big brand names to this country so may think other brands are small companies and inferior products (some are inferior but might be from massive companies).  It depends on your use and driving style but a second level tyre brand (often owned by better known prestige brands) could well be a very good tyre but in "last season's" design or tread pattern.

 

I've seen that perhaps it's the bigger brands changing their compounds more struggling to use different materials on ever wider tyres even on family shopping trollies that rarely get out of town or above 30mph and the roads are full of deep potholes where smaller wheels and more sidewall tyre depth would help.

 

I'm not sure how you got to the overall of 23k though, surely (don't call me Shirley) given 2.5mm wear in 8,900 miles, if you took off another 2.5mm (assuming same wear rate to tyre) you'd be at 1.5mm left for less than 18k overall, unless I've missed something, as I often do.

 

With all these fancy cars now I don't hear so many moans about not getting 45k miles out of a tyre, they're still there but not as much must be the work of all theses surface-dressing multimillionaire pushing council contracts.  😄

 

[Patent]

I've never had more than about 12k out of a set of fronts on my last 4 cars so the OP seems normal to me

 

ETA. If you take your own tread depth gauge I'd wager you have 4mm+ on those "amber" tyres

 

Edited 29 October, 2021 by Patent

[JohnBob]

I have an iV on 19" wheels and based on wear so far, think the set will last ~20k miles.  I drive like Miss Daisy, and previously got 40k miles with 17" wheels on a

2.0Tdi, both wagons.  I think car weight and wheel size have an effect, though I can't prove the latter.

[KenONeill]

16 minutes ago, JohnBob said:

I drive like Miss Daisy

sitting in the back, and with Morgan Freeman as your chauffeur!? 

[nta16]

3 hours ago, JohnBob said:

 I drive like Miss Daisy, and previously got 40k miles with 17" wheels on a 2.0Tdi, both wagons.  I think car weight and wheel size have an effect, though I can't prove the latter.

You might be using the car's torque more with the bigger wheels as they slow the acceleration, plus all the tyres and driving circumstances would have to be (reasonable) the same for a comparison and even if the tyres were the same make and model they can vary in their make up in different sizes, then add in over time the composition of the tyres might have changed even if same make and model.

 

If you're comparing different types or makes or models of tyre 17" to 19" tyres then the wear figures could vary a lot.

 

Having put that it's a big difference so the cars must have other differences(?).  40k, where they slicks when you changed them, rear wheel use only I'd guess, but well done on 40k out of them (if they weren't slicks of course). 👍

 

[SurreyJohn]

5 hours ago, JohnBob said:

I have an iV on 19" wheels and based on wear so far, think the set will last ~20k miles.  I drive like Miss Daisy, and previously got 40k miles with 17" wheels on a

2.0Tdi, both wagons.  I think car weight and wheel size have an effect, though I can't prove the latter.

The iV has lot of heavy batteries.

 

However the difference is starting torque, a Diesel engine has very low torque at walking speed (it builds up as engine gets to ideal speed), but electric drive can give max torque from zero (its more a case of limiting power drawn to avoid motors getting hot).  Regenerative braking can be lot more fierce than disc brakes (but it doesn’t work at low speed, so brakes will be blended so that it is mainly disc friction brake as you approach standstill)

 

That is why tyre manufacturers have started to make EV spec tyres (even more heavy duty than XL tyres).  Traditional car tyres are not designed for these loads.

 

 

[MarkyG82]

16 hours ago, nta16 said:

 

I'm not sure how you got to the overall of 23k though, surely (don't call me Shirley) given 2.5mm wear in 8,900 miles, if you took off another 2.5mm (assuming same wear rate to tyre) you'd be at 1.5mm left for less than 18k overall, unless I've missed something, as I often do.

 Granted I went on 0mm as the end point. Not great advice. My excuse is it's my birthday and I am now 1pt and half a bottle of (very nice) wine down. Cake and rum still to go.

 

I'll recalculate and pull figures out of the hat later. 

[Ootohere]

Regen braking is not locking up tyres and wearing them that way..

Plenty EV's are not on specfic EV tyres and as it is anyway in the UK there is the NSL. eg, On crap Michelin Primacy 4

So maybe tyres are being spun but then a driver would know that as they are the driver. Or the pressures are wrong.

 

Lots of heavy vehicles on wider or low profile tyres are on UK roads and get decent wear over lots of miles. 

They can be FWD, RWD or AWD.

 

Some tyres are actually just rubbish be them OEM or not. 

As far as Budget Tyres being soft, then there are ones that are hard and hence ditchfinders, just like many now OEM ECO Tyres the VW Group fit.

Big Brand, not cheap just bad for what the driver wants.  Traction / Friction / Safe with loved ones in their car.

Edited 30 October, 2021 by roottoot

[MarkyG82]

I think we can all agree that there are far to many variables to say what will last or not. Maybe one of the biggest factors is how the tyres are used. Be that driving style/use or pressure maintenance. Abuse a tyre by either pushing too hard or out of the recommended pressure range and you'll end up with worn rubber.

[Black263]

I'm a 73 yr old with Rospa Gold and IAM.  I don't punish my tyres.  However, I'm the second user and the first was a Skoda manager, who put on 7k of the miles, and I've no idea how he drove.

[nta16]

5 hours ago, MarkyG82 said:

My excuse is it's my birthday and I am now 1pt and half a bottle of (very nice) wine down. Cake and rum still to go.

Happy birthday.

 

I can not allow wine as an excuse as a real ale drinker, but cake and rum is a different matter, especially the cake.  Enjoy!  🥳

 

[JohnBob]

21 hours ago, nta16 said:

You might be using the car's torque more with the bigger wheels as they slow the acceleration, plus all the tyres and driving circumstances would have to be (reasonable) the same for a comparison and even if the tyres were the same make and model they can vary in their make up in different sizes, then add in over time the composition of the tyres might have changed even if same make and model.

 

If you're comparing different types or makes or models of tyre 17" to 19" tyres then the wear figures could vary a lot.

 

Having put that it's a big difference so the cars must have other differences(?).  40k, where they slicks when you changed them, rear wheel use only I'd guess, but well done on 40k out of them (if they weren't slicks of course). 👍

 

Everything pretty much equal apart from the car.  40k was when all 4 tyres were swapped having been rotated front to back.  

[SurreyJohn]

On 28/10/2021 at 22:17, Black263 said:

Centre is 3.6.  Edges are 4.5 on both front tyres.  I asked the engineer if it was over-inflation and he said that it wasn't and was normal wear.  I think I'll skip rotating the tyres as I used to have Winter/Summer wheels and more recently Crossclimates.  I can't remember the last time I went through the Winter on Summer tyres.  (At least 20 years), so I'll just bin them before the end of Nov, and go Crossclimate 2.

Good choice on choosing Cross climate 2