Hybrid Auris Ts: Wearing All Four Tyres Equally Much?

[Nicolai]

Wien I changed to Winther tires, tre mechanic at my local garage told me that a hybrid vehicle like mine wears all four tires equally. This was his response to my question regarding the possible benefit of swapping front to back and vice versa. I was surprised to hear this. I drive very conservatively (quite slow actually) and I'm very gentle on my brakes and tires. What do you think?

[FROSTYBALLS]

Could be possible. Think it partly depends what the weight distribution is front/rear. We had a Mazda Premacy MPV, and that wore its tyres evenly all round.

[PeteB]

I've driven Prius Gen 1, 2 and 3, and they certainly wear their tyres much more quickly than the rears. I think most front wheel drive cars do, as the front wheels have to cope with accelerating, (most) braking and steering.

[RunningInPleasePass]

I've just had all four of my tyres replaced after over 30k miles and never had them swapped front to rear, they were worn less then a mm difference front and back.

[Nicolai]

Interesting. I thought that, as a rule of thumb, only 4X4s wore their tires evenly. I would think that F- and RWD cars doing so would have faults. Perhaps not. But the rears, not being subjected to the torque the fronts have to deal with, should last longer, I think. I have not asked everyone I know, however, I have never heard of even tires wear on FWD cars?

[FROSTYBALLS]

Aside from the Premacy (which was front wheel drive) all of cars we've bought from new (17), have worn the front tyres faster than the rear tyres.

[RunningInPleasePass]

All the front wheel drive cars I've ever owned have worn front faster then back, but when my car had it's 30k miles service the health check sheet quoted:

NSF = 4.2mm

OSF = 4.1mm

OSR = 4.4mm

NSR = 3.8mm

I've added about 2k miles since then, then had all four changed.

[Nicolai]

Right, I have a copy og tre Heath check sheet AS Well. Will have a look there.

[Ethanedwards]

Nope. Yaris HSD (driven carefully) the rear ones way outlasted the fronts. By about five thousand miles. Totally unsurprising as 100% of the torque , 100% of the steering and 80% of the braking is done by the front. Even on my 4x4 Xtrail the fronts wore quicker as well. Also power steering can cause the front tyres to wear at the inner edges. Sorry your mechanic is being highly optomistic to say the least.

[FROSTYBALLS]

Have just looked at the health check completed at the 2 year service on my petrol Auris, and the tread measurements taken were

NSF tyre 5mm

OSF tyre 5mm

NSR tyre 6mm

OSR tyre 6mm

So for mine the wear is relatively even front/rear, and when the fronts are due to be replaced, I may as well replace all four.

[Nicolai]

I should mention that my garage swapping my tires is not a Toyota dealer. I have Toyota service the car though. Just checked out the status report after one year and 15,000 km. left and right front were then 4.5 mm and left and right back were 5.5. I'll have to calculate how many miles each set of tires has actually done though.