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A while back I posted that I had a flat tire and I was going to buy a used one with a comparable circumference. We're going to do some traveling later this week and I decided to "test" the rolling circumference of the new tire. Basically I found a parking lot, marked the tires, and let one tire roll 40 revolutions and measured the difference in rotations of the other tires. The results were: the 3 old tires are within the 1/4 inch and the 1 "new" tire is off by about 3/4 inch. (I estimate my error is about +/- 0.1 inch).

 

My "stupid" question is this: the FWD fuse is still in. can I park the car on a steep hill, place something underneath the "new" tire so that traction is comprimised (some sand maybe), and get into the car and just stomp on the gas? the possible result is the tire with the comprimised traction will spin like crazy, while the other front tire will just sit there until the car gets going. If I do this, I'll burn off some of the tread on the "new" tire and get it within the 1/4 inch spec. I guess I should mention the car is a 00 forester auto and the "bad" tire is LF.

 

The reason I think this is stupid is, am I making a so-so situation possibly worse?

 

as a side note, using a tape measure to measure tire circumference sucks. It's cumbersome and not precise. (I did 3 measurements on the same tire and got 3 numbers- with a range of just under 1/4 inch) when I shopped for a used tire, I used a tape measure and apparently it did me no good.

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I had the same problem having to replace one tire and decided to peplace two tires instead on the same axle. If you want to mach the tires by burning rubber.

 

I would suggest going to a racing garage and have them shave down the new tire to match all the tires the same. It might be cheaper to just buy two tires.

Hope that helps, Greg...

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I considered getting 2 new tires. but from what I read on this forum, I got the impression that was "bad."

 

Greg, how long have you been running with 2 sets of tires? I'm beginning to think that the 1/4" tolerance was just set super-conservative.

 

How many people on this board have actually measured the rolling circumference to check if their tires are within 1/4" of each other (not using the tape measure, but driving in a straight line)?

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I'm thinking that nothing but bad could come from that and the resulting tire wear probably wouldn't be satisfactory. You could end up like a guy in the parking lot here and suddenly gain traction, ending up with the front end of your car planted in to the dumpster...or other stationary object/person/intersection. I also don't think it would be very good on your car to spin the tire like that for as long as it would take to remove 1/4 inch of rubber. Mechanical problems aside, you could end up overheating the tire and have a problem later with the tread separating from the tire.

 

Isn't there a Discount Tires store or other low cost tire place in your area where you could just pick up two matching $30.00 tires? A lot of places will even sell good used tires that have 20,000 miles left on them for $10.00 or so. Often you can get them where they are from the same set and they match circumference.

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