Proposed tire rotation scheme?

[Fast Eddie B]

I rotated our Clarity’s tires front-to-rear at 10,000 miles. We just hit 20,000.

My plan is to rotate left-to-right now, then again front-to-rear at 30k, left-to-right at 40k, and so on. That should end up having each tire serving on a different corner of the car over time.

I do recall that, historically, switching radial tires side-to-side was frowned upon, on the theory that radial tires took a rotational “set”, but I’m pretty sure modern radials don’t seem to care, as shown by rotation patterns recommended by manufacturers now.

Thoughts? And can anyone point me to the jack points to lift the front and rear of the car, respectively? I have two floor jacks, and so could use the side jack points, but a single point would be easier.

Thanks in advance.

 

[AlAl]

If I'm not mistaken, the tires on the Clarities are Asymmetric. You're supposed to bring fronts to rear, cross rears and bring to front

 

[Fast Eddie B]

If I'm not mistaken, the tires on the Clarities are Asymmetric.

I don’t think so. If they were, would not the tires need to show direction of rotation? They don’t as far as I can see.

 

[fotomoto]

Our OutBack gets F to R every 10k because it's said the AWD is sensitive to different tire OD sizes. Tire wear seems very even (on 2nd set).

OTOH, I'm not rotating the tires on my C-Max. First, it's mainly urban driving and low use (2013 with only 38k miles) and two, I'm following some advice from another owner who subscribes to this method: on FWD cars, the fronts do all the work (and thus wear) so let them wear out, rotate rears to front, and only have to buy two new (expensive LRR) tires instead of a set of four. Then mount the new pair on the rear which need the most traction. Currently, the fronts with nearly 40k are feathering on the edges but still have some more life and recently passed inspection a couple of months ago.

FWIW

 

[insightman]

The Clarity's tires don't have rotation marks. From page 506 in the Clarity Owners Manual:

 

[craze1cars]

If I'm not mistaken, the tires on the Clarities are Asymmetric. You're supposed to bring fronts to rear, cross rears and bring to front

Right answer. Wrong term.

Put the word “non-directional” in place of asymmetric above, and we have a correct sentence.

All of Honda’s answers are in the owners manual, including clear photos of all jack points.

That said, in my experience, and being a rather high mileage driver of often 60k to 80k per year spread out over all my 3 vehicles, including extensive heavy trailer towing service on the truck, and doing all rotations myself, there is little to no benefit and only hassle to swapping tires left and right. So mine always go front to rear only and spend their entire lives on the same side of the car. Can’t remember the last time I had a set of tires on any car go below 4/32 tread in less than 75k miles unless I picked up sidewall damage. And it’s a whole lot easier to just put 2 floor jacks on one side of the car to DIY a one sided rotation, rather than messing with jackstands and all that garbage involved in crossing left to right.

 

[2002]

Front to back rotation is the most important as that is the biggest wear difference. However there can be some wear difference on each side, primarily due to the fact that in a turn the outer tire rolls a longer distance. In the U.S. right-hand turns are usually tighter than left-hand turns, and also freeway cloverleaf type of exits are usually to the right. There could also be mechanical differences on each side. So manufacturers typically recommend a cross pattern unless the tires are directional in which case they can only be rotated front to back without remounting the tires on the wheel.

This is the diagram shown in the Clarity owners manual:

However it is not common for standard tires to be directional, if they are they will be marked as such on the sidewall.

My 2006 Prius recommended only front to back rotation, not sure why unless maybe the OEM's were directional, but in hindsight it seemed to go against convention. But it was nice for DIY because you just had to jack up one side of the car, swap the tires, then jack up the other side of the car and do the same. However moving a tire from left rear to right front for example is not so easy without a lift and only using jacks. On a previous car I used the donut spare as a temporary stand in while jacking one side of the car at a time. But not having a spare for Clarity what I am thinking about doing is to jack up the rear of the car first and swapping the rear tires, then hand tighten the lugs to snug but no need to torque them. Then jack up each side of the car like I did with my Prius and swap front to rear. Three jackings instead of two but relatively straightforward and in the end the tires will end up where they are supposed to be.

Or as craze1cars (who beat me by three minutes) says it may not matter that much and I have thought about only rotating front to back. I might try my rear wheel swap method the first time to see if it adds that much more time.

 

[S L .]

Just follow the manual for rotation pattern. I doubt that these tires would last that long. Had 25k mi on my other clarity id estimate 50k max on the oem tires. Btw the oem tires are different from the michelins you buy from the tire store. Non oem have the rim guards.


Sent from my iPhone using Inside EVs

 

[2002]

Just follow the manual for rotation pattern.

For DIY it's not quite as easy to "Just follow the manual". If a car is on a lift then sure why not cross sides it's just as easy, so naturally they will recommend that in the manual, why not. But for those who choose to DIY the potentially slight increase in mileage may not be worth going to the extra effort of a criss-cross pattern.

 

[Sandroad]

I rotated our Clarity’s tires front-to-rear at 10,000 miles. We just hit 20,000.

My plan is to rotate left-to-right now, then again front-to-rear at 30k, left-to-right at 40k, and so on. That should end up having each tire serving on a different corner of the car over time.

I do recall that, historically, switching radial tires side-to-side was frowned upon, on the theory that radial tires took a rotational “set”, but I’m pretty sure modern radials don’t seem to care, as shown by rotation patterns recommended by manufacturers now.

Thoughts? And can anyone point me to the jack points to lift the front and rear of the car, respectively? I have two floor jacks, and so could use the side jack points, but a single point would be easier.

Thanks in advance.

Use 2 jacks, if you've got them. This thing is heavy. The jack points are the reinforced areas on the rocker panels. I use a rubber pad with a slot in it with my floor jack. Although the manual calls for a modified cross pattern, F-R is fine. No need to rotate L-R unless you're doing a lot of oval track racing. Your plan would result in a tires ending up on the front or rear for 20,000 miles, which is too long.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

And it’s a whole lot easier to just put 2 floor jacks on one side of the car to DIY a one sided rotation, rather than messing with jackstands and all that garbage involved in crossing left to right.

I was hoping a single jack could raise either end given central front and rear jack points, which I vaguely recall hearing mentioned. Otherwise, swapping the fronts left to right, and the same on the rear, seems no more complicated than swapping on the same side - just two jacks on the appropriate front or rear jack points.

 

[KentuckyKen]

The easiest way to accomplish the rearward cross tire rotation pattern of the manual is like @Fast Eddie B hopes for above. You only need one jack and 4 jack stands.
Here’s how I did it.
1. Loosen the lugnuts
2. Jack up rear using the tow hook jack point and inset two jack stands at rear lifting points and lower.
3. Jack up front using hump jack point in undercover cut out between wheels and insert two jack stands at front lift points.
4. Now all 4 tires are ready to swap however your heat desires and you only jacked twice but you do have to move the jack one extra time over @craze1cars non crossing method.

The jack and lift points are from the Attached PDI on page 2.

One note on safety. I’m not a big time prepper, but I do believe in their adage that “Two is one, and one is none” as far as potential failures go.
So when on the jack stands, I leave the front jack under a little tension and shove a thick non “tippy” tree trunk under the rear. That way even though I’m not under the car, I have a safety back up. I think the military calls that defense in depth. I also keep my cell phone in my pocket.
Remember the old TV show Hill Street Blues? “Hey, lets be safe out there.”

 

[2002]

The easiest way to accomplish the rearward cross tire rotation pattern of the manual is like @insightman hopes for above. You only need one jack and 4 jack stands.
Here’s how I did it.
1. Loosen the lugnuts
2. Jack up rear using the tow hook jack point and inset two jack stands at rear lifting points and lower.
3. Jack up front using hump jack point in undercover cut out between wheels and insert two jack stands at front lift points.
4. Now all 4 tires are ready to swap however your heat desires and you only jacked twice but you do have to move the jack one extra time over @craze1cars non crossing method.

One note on safety. I’m not a big time prepper, but I do believe in their adage that “Teo is one

In the old days it was common for people to put cars on blocks for short term storage to avoid damaging the tires, but that was when passenger cars had hefty body on frame construction. With today's unibody construction on most cars I'm not so sure how good it is for the car to lift one end while the other end is on jack stands. Maybe it's okay but I prefer a method where only one end or side of the car is lifted at a time even if it means one extra lift using the method I'm thinking of doing where the rear tires are swapped first, then each side is swapped. Again that's only if it is felt that cross rotating is really needed.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

Remember the old TV show Hill Street Blues? “Hey, lets be safe out there.”

Remember it? We’re bingeing it!

And it changed from “Hey, let’s be careful out there” to “Let’s do it to them before they do it to us” after a cast change.*


*Trying to avoid blurting out a spoiler.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

2. Jack up rear using the tow hook jack point and inset two jack stands at rear lifting points and lower.
3. Jack up front using hump jack point in undercover cut out between wheels and insert two jack stands at front lift points.

Can you confirm the tow hook is an approved jack point? And the undercover cut out at the front is obvious?

 

[Sandroad]

Speaking of being careful........I know it’s been said before, but there’s a 17kW battery under there. It’s well protected and yet, no fair guessing on what’s a good jack point. Use the pdf @KentuckyKen posted for info. And, if necessary, take the relevant page to your tire installer.

 

[KentuckyKen]

In the old days it was common for people to put cars on blocks for short term storage to avoid damaging the tires, but that was when passenger cars had hefty body on frame construction. With today's unibody construction on most cars I'm not so sure how good it is for the car to lift one end while the other end is on jack stands. Maybe it's okay but I prefer a method where only one end or side of the car is lifted at a time even if it means one extra lift using the method I'm thinking of doing where the rear tires are swapped first, then each side is swapped. Again that's only if it is felt that cross rotating is really needed.

I miss the old body on frame build too (but not the weight). They were so much easier to repair and no computers or lasers required.

And I appreciate the concern about being kind to the uni-body especially since the car is rather heavy due to the battery pack. But the jack points are Honda recommended and I can’t see any undue stress from using them and jacking with either the front or rear lift points equally supported. That would appear to me to not put as much torque on the uni-body as jacking from just one lift point on one side which tends to raise one side’s tire a little before the other one.
Remember that jacking from either the front or rear lift point is not raising that side from its center of gravity. At least the front and rear jack points are centered and you have have 3 points not just 1 carrying the load at that time with no twisting torque.
But I’m definitely not a real engineer. It just looks OK or even better to my country boy, redneck school of engineering. And we’d all agree that a mechanic’s lift that raises from all 4 lift points simultaneously is obviously the least stressful or torquey.

Hmm, now you got me wondering why the 4 side points are called lift points while the centered front and back points are called jacking points. Is Honda trying to tell us something?
If you’re just changing a tire, it seems to me there is less stress or torque on the structure by using the centered front and rear jacking points rather than an off center side lifting point. Or maybe the torque difference is too small to worry about compared to the strength of the structure. And Honda doesn’t give any warnings about any of this, so it must not be a big deal.
We’re in desperate need of an engineer here!

 

[KentuckyKen]

Can you confirm the tow hook is an approved jack point? And the undercover cut out at the front is obvious?

Yes on both. See page 2 of the PDI I attached to post #12. The front jacking point is just a little harder to get the jack to. It helps that I have a low profile jack.
Also, I think I remember not being able to take full pump strokes on the floor jack. I had to short stroke it to keep from hitting the bumper.

 

[css28]

On my Volt I'd do the cross-side rotation by using a donut spare that I'd bought for the car.
You just lift one corner of the car, install the spare, then work your way around the car until you've replaced the spare with the last tire.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

Yes on both. See page 2 of the PDI I attached to post #12. The front jacking point is just a little harder to get the jack to. It helps that I have a low profile jack.
Also, I think I remember not being able to take full pump strokes on the floor jack. I had to short stroke it to keep from hitting the bumper.

Thanks. Though when I click on your link, I just get the a pdf of the whole Owner’s Manual, and all I can find there are the side jack points. A screen shot maybe?