User 53024

Well I'm thinking of my T1-Ses. If I took the right tire off the wheel and put it on the other side such that the outside sidewall was still the outside sidewall, it would be backwards. So I'd have to mount the tire such that what used to be the outside sidewall is now the inside sidewall. That would be the only way to get the direction of rotation correct.

xviper

I call it "flipping" the tires. I wrote up a thread about it some time ago:
https://www.s2ki.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=128526

User 53024

I just read the entire thread and have a couple of questions.

Many moons ago someone told me that you can't change the wear pattern of a tire. IIRC I had a tire wearing unevenly and went to a shop inquiring about an alignment and was told that even if they corrected the alignment the tire would continue the current wear pattern rather than evening it out.

Also, you specifically state that the tire is flipped on the same wheel and the whole shebang gets put on the other side of the car. What is the advantage of that vs putting the tire on the other wheel so the wheels stay on the same side side of the car but the tires switch sides?

xviper

There is no difference. The rim itself is not unidirectional, so it doesn't care which side of the car it goes on, so your statement is also valid. The rim can stay on the same side or be switched side to side.
Flipping the tire is not an adverse procedure since the tire still spins in the same direction. Because of the natural high camber of our car, it just wears more on the inside portion of the tread unless you track the car, in which case lateral g's can equalize the tread wear (I suppose that's why the high camber - to plant more rubber in track conditions). For your average street driven car, the outside still wears but not nearly as much. Flipping just puts the remaining "good" tread where it's needed. This is contingent upon doing the flip while there is still some useable tread on the "worn" side. I don't think a tire has a "memory" as to which portion of the tread wears faster.

mikegarrison

Whoever told you that is wrong. Just take your car to the track a couple times and you will see that you have completely changed the "wear pattern" of the tire. BTW, if you go to the track you will find the fronts wear a little faster than the rears. Depends on how much understeer you allow.

mikegarrison

Tracked S2Ks with stock tires and street alignments are going to wear a LOT faster on the outside of the front tires. Unmounting/remounting is still valuable, but it is to even out the wear on the outsides rather than the insides.

Also, depending on which direction your track goes, one side of the car may show a lot more wear than the other side.

l8brakr

The only advantage would be that rim is already on the tire machine, why take it off when you can just flip the tire and remount? Instead you would have to take both tires off then inspect the tread to figure out which way they are to go back on since you set them next to each other on the ground and can't remember which rim they came off. Sometimes things are simple for a reason don't over think them.

xviper

This is EXACTLY what the tire shop did to me. They just couldn't do it the easy way. The dumbasses just had to take both tires off first, then they stood there and scratched their heads and wondered which tire came from which rim. THEY GOT IT WRONG! I even told them what to do - take off tire, turn over, put back onto same wheel. Geez, how they can walk and chew gum is a mystery to me.