Tried searching the forum for this.. apologies but couldn’t find it.

What’s the general consensus- when you get a flat, do you replace 2 tires or all 4?

If you change all 4 because of a tread difference, what maximum tread difference do you go by before deciding to change all 4?

 

Assume you had unrepairable sidewall damage. I always do all four ... or forever live with the difference. Possible exception (to save money) would be 80+% tread remaining on the keeper pair. Also all tires should be the same brand, model and generation. Tires for me are the most important safety component on any vehicle ... so saving money is never my priority.

 

In the past if I got a flat because of a nail in the side wall and the tire could not be repaired, I would replace the one tire. If I could not replace the tire with the same model I would then replace all 4 tires. On a 4 WD vehicle my thoughts are that all 4 tires should be the same, especially the size.

 

I know on a full time viscous coupling center diff vehicle I previously had it would damage that unit if tires were outside of 3 or 4/32 from other tires. I could never get a response from Torsen.com if this was the case as well on a GX. I realize different center diff.

Owner's manual




You could do a 5 tire rotation as well

 

P-Rated tires essentially have a "passenger vehicle tread pattern" that are not extremely deep ... whereas many All-Terrain Tires and definitely Hybrid All-Terrain / Mud Tires can have a very deep tread where the rotational speed difference is a consideration to Acrads point.

 

Wife got an unrepairable flat about a month after we bought a CPO with about 65% to 70% tread life left on the other 3. I opted to use it as an opportunity to replace all 5 tires since the spare turned out to be of a different make (I should have checked that before I bought). I now do 5 wheel rotation every 5kish so that now if I do get another flat I will just buy one tire and use that as spare and shift to a 4 tire rotation, leaving spare unused. Then will decide at replacement time if the unused spare is too old, if not, I will just buy 4 new ones and go back to 5 tire rotation.

 

Is this really from the Lexus manual? You always keep the wheels on the same side and not actually rotate them all? I forgot where I got this from, but this is the one I've always followed for 4WD/4x4 with a full size spare.

 

Owner's Manual Examples... all of them

2010 Page 628

2012 page 628

2019 Page 474

2022 Page 488




'22 4R


'22 LX 600



'22 Tundra

 

I never use the spare in rotation ... and always maintain the direction of rotation, so never switch sides. Some tires based on the tread design have an arrow on the sidewall for rotation orientation.

 

I don't do spare either and only swap same side as well. I haven't noticed any adverse wear patterns.

 

Very interesting... I've never done it like that before. Where I live, I make a lot of left turns so I've always done rotations like what I showed above.

 

By using the spare in rotation ... why would someone want one tire that is always "off" relative to the other(s) in terms of diameter ? ... why go there ?

 

Lexus Dealership uses the pattern in the manual (or so they claim), so no side switching. Maybe the 3 tire rotation on the passenger side is meant to mitgate the crown - so drivers side tires erode to have slightly smaller radius?

 

So that you can replace just one tire rather than 4 or 5 if you get a flat. Having had to drop over $1k on tires on my AWD IS250 bc of a flat I opted to do the 5 tire rotation on the GX.
Reason not to I guess is added complexity in the rotation and on average the passenger side tires wear 2/3 the rate of the driver's. I guess after 30k miles or so, the passenger side tires might have closer to 2/32 less wear - maybe that is fine given the natural crown of the road?
t is acceptable maintenance according the the manual.
But I can see not bothering.

 

For me the probability of getting a sidewall puncture is low, so the spare stays tucked.