Try not to laugh too hard at this question...

So I am just a lover of my 2004 Z roadster, but no expert on the mechanics. Want to rotate tires (Bridestone Potenza's and recall seeing a performance rating of 92, plus tread wear 140, temerature A ratings maybe?). They are designed to be used in a single rotational direction.

I was planning to rotate the tires front to back to move the front tires back to the drive axle, since I have much higher wear on the drive axle tires. But it appears that the wheels are keyed to front or back only (couldn't get the rear wheels to seat on the front axle due to a pin that was included on the front axle and slightly different axle-side configuration of the wheel on the inside as well).

So unless I am missing something, it appears to be a bad thing to rotate tires and I need to just run the front and rear pairs until they need to be replaced. Is that the case?

 

with my Z in order to rotate the tires i would have to have the tires physically taken off the rims and put back on the other side due to the directional tread and the front and rear being different sizes

i can only rotate side to side for now and i have yet to do it b/c i dont want my wheels scratched up by some noob at the tire shop. sooo when these wear out im going to shop around for different tires that are easier to rotate, probably same size all around

 

i'm guessing that you're not running different size tires front and back? I know when I put my new wheels on my car, the front had this nut that needed to be removed. I took it off and it really didn't look like it held anything...not sure why it was there but I know a lot of guys who had to remove this to put on aftermarket wheels. Just take it off...you'll be fine.

 

If you have 17-inch wheels, they are not the same size. Neither are the tires.
If you have 18-inch wheels, the tires are not the same size.

 

Thanks for the quick feedback guys. This is a great site for information. The tires are different sizes. Rear are 235/50R17 96W, But the fronts are 94W. Would have been one weird look that's for sure.

So thanks again and I will just let these continue to wear and then replace as needed. Probably cheaper than two replacement wheels to get them all the same size at least over a reasonable time period.

J

 

I think you got your answer, but you can only swap side to side as the tires are not the same (assuming you have the OEM tires.) I have a 2003, and the POTENZA tires were made with sipes that were huge (the little cut lines in the tread). This caused the tires to wear horribly, and burn up in about 5000 miles or so. They blamed it orginally on alignment (think of the line from Animal House when they were in the kangaroo court). However, after my second set of free tires, I noticed that the tread had changed.... the dealer and I looked at the tread design, and it turned out that Bridgestone redesigned the sipe dimension so the tire would not squiggle as you went down the road. The third set of tires (magically) has lasted from 18K to 56K, and there is still decent tread on them- surprise.... I did swap out the rears for some aggressive Goodyears- looks cooler, and I have had much better wear out of Goodyears and Michelins for the past 30 years.