Bridgestone EP422 tires swapped for Michelin Primacy MXV4s.

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Yes, now you should put the good rears in the front and the low tires in the back.... You should really have rotated the tires every 8K miles or so...

PS - I have 30K miles on my Ecopias, and they still seem to have about 70% tread on them. I don't see why people should spend a lot on more expensive tires that will only decrease the range... The Leaf really is not a car that should be driven like a track car...
 
I prefer never to rotate tires...

use the front pair until it wears out, put the new pair in the rear and put the mid wear tires that were in the rear in the front.

that way, when I have to buy tires, I only have to spend money in 2 tires and I always have better tires in the back than the front, wich is safer on most cars.
 
sparrow79 said:
have better tires in the back than the front, wich is safer on most cars.
I've never heard that opinion before. I always thought it best to have the better tire on the fronts for the higher need of traction and braking.
 
DuncanCunningham said:
I've never heard that opinion before. I always thought it best to have the better tire on the fronts for the higher need of traction and braking.
It is quite common for tire shops and professionals to recommend putting the best pair of tires on the rear of the car, regardless of weight, drive wheels, etc.

Better for the driver = new tires on front

Better for liability insurance = new tires on back for less risk of oversteer
 
VitaminJ said:
DuncanCunningham said:
I've never heard that opinion before. I always thought it best to have the better tire on the fronts for the higher need of traction and braking.
It is quite common for tire shops and professionals to recommend putting the best pair of tires on the rear of the car, regardless of weight, drive wheels, etc.

Better for the driver = new tires on front

Better for liability insurance = new tires on back for less risk of oversteer
+1
I'm also of the mindset to put the better tires on the front for a front wheel drive car, on the rear for a rear wheel drive car but when I wanted Costco to put new tires only on the front they refused saying they could only put the better tires on the rear. I didn't argue and as soon as I got home I got out the jack and jackstands and promptly swapped the tires the way I wanted them
 
VitaminJ said:
It is quite common for tire shops and professionals to recommend putting the best pair of tires on the rear of the car, regardless of weight, drive wheels, etc.
I would have thought they did that because you'd be back sooner to replace the fronts, meaning more business, sooner rather than later.. but that is the cynic in me.
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSz7cm6MwH0

http://www.souzastireservice.com/tires-101/front-or-rear.aspx

for safety better tires always for rear.
 
I agree that video sure makes a good case for best tires on the rear but I still don't understand why in the side by side same MPH, the vehicle with the worn tires in the front didn't lose traction in the front(which would be worse than losing traction in the rear). I understand them saying by putting the worn tires on the front the driver would become aware sooner of poor road conditions and therefore slow down but thats not what the video showed, it showed identical vehicles, identical speed the car with worn fronts handled just fine but with the worn tires on the rear that car fish tailed....
Maybe it's because the vehicle was front heavy and the extra weight on the front helped the worn front tires grip the road??
 
jjeff said:
I agree that video sure makes a good case for best tires on the rear but I still don't understand why in the side by side same MPH, the vehicle with the worn tires in the front didn't lose traction in the front(which would be worse than losing traction in the rear). I understand them saying by putting the worn tires on the front the driver would become aware sooner of poor road conditions and therefore slow down but thats not what the video showed, it showed identical vehicles, identical speed the car with worn fronts handled just fine but with the worn tires on the rear that car fish tailed....
Maybe it's because the vehicle was front heavy and the extra weight on the front helped the worn front tires grip the road??
Good question too. The Nissan Leaf is is Humpty Dumpty of a car and i expect the weight distribution to be different to a typical ICE car.

Understeer - the loss of grip from the front. gives you the feeling of less grip, like the car is pushing too much and is controlled by reducing speed
Oversteer - the loss of grip from the rears, is much harder to correct, as it's typically too late once you notice.
 
First I have to say I am an advocate for all four matched tires, it avoids all this. Having said that when I put the snows or summers on I put the better tires up front (maybe .5 mil better tread). While it is true that with a better griping tire up front you are more likely to over-steer that is just one component of driving. Straight out braking you will stop faster with better tires up front becasue most of the stopping force is on the front tires not the rears and avoiding a collision by rapid braking is the most common practice to avoid accidents in the first place. Also being front wheel drive, having better tires up front gets you moving and more importantly not getting stuck in the first place.

Again I don't run mis-matched tires and don't recommend it. I rotate to often, 5k miles and look at the tires when I do, but these are things to consider as well.
 
BrockWI said:
...Straight out braking you will stop faster with better tires up front becasue most of the stopping force is on the front tires not the rears and avoiding a collision by rapid braking is the most common practice to avoid accidents in the first place. Also being front wheel drive, having better tires up front gets you moving and more importantly not getting stuck in the first place.
Those are all good points I had forgot about, I'm back in the better on front camp but I agree having all tires be similar is the best of options.
 
sparrow79 said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSz7cm6MwH0

http://www.souzastireservice.com/tires-101/front-or-rear.aspx

for safety better tires always for rear.

very informative which means we need to takeaway the most important statement

"If ONLY replacing two tires, put the new ones on the rear"

The ideology of rotating tires front to rear on a regular basis still stands. for intervals, I recommend no more than every 5,000 miles. I blogged about doing it at a 10,000 mile interval and that was a mistake. no more than every 5,000 miles!
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
The ideology of rotating tires front to rear on a regular basis still stands. for intervals, I recommend no more than every 5,000 miles. I blogged about doing it at a 10,000 mile interval and that was a mistake. no more than every 5,000 miles!

I used to rotate every 10,000 miles on regulars (before leaf) now I do that ever 5000 miles. This also forces me to look over everything else with the tires and related parts as well. And since we have snows rotating them isn't a big deal, just pop a snow tire on the first spot and rotate until the snow is back off. I rotate all the cars at 5,000 now and they do wear so much more even, although I am not sure if I would see an alignment problem like I used to not rotating them as often :)
 
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