The wear pattern on a set of tyres is a record of what pressure they have been run at. Both outer shoulders scrubbed away with good tread still down the middle means the tyre has been carrying the car on its edges, and that means it has been soft. A worn strip up the centre with sound shoulders means the opposite.
It shows up first on the heavy stuff. A large SUV or a 4x4 puts far more weight through the same contact patch, so a couple of psi short does damage it would never do on a small hatchback, and it starts on the front pair because that is the end carrying the engine.
Which is why the pressure question is worth settling when you buy rather than afterwards. Most cars carry two figures on the tyre placard: one for everyday use and one for a full load. On a big car those two are meaningfully different, and running the everyday figure with the boot packed and five people aboard is how a new set loses its shoulders early.
A tyre bought in a hurry is usually the wrong tyre. Once it is settled, the van comes to you in KT6 with the tyre already on board, fits it where the car stands and balances every wheel it touches. A tight terrace in Berrylands or a narrow bay on Brighton Road is usually workable. Steep camber in Long Ditton? We move a few metres, Alexandra Drive or anywhere else.
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Heavy cars and tight streets go together badly across Surbiton, out toward Tolworth and around Berrylands, where a car spends its week at low speed on full lock and then goes out fully loaded at the weekend. Those are the two things that punish shoulders. Because we come to the driveway, a gauge goes on all four before anything is fitted.
Fronts worn to the cords on the outer edges with four millimetres left in the middle, on a car that had never had a gauge put on it. Four new tyres went on a driveway in Long Ditton and the pressures came off the placard.
A family heading north with a full boot, roof bars and four passengers. We fitted the set they had chosen a week earlier and set the laden figures rather than the everyday ones, with a note of what to bring them back to.
Two owners of the same model on the same tyres, one set worn evenly and one ruined at the shoulders inside twenty thousand miles. The difference was that one checked pressures monthly and the other assumed a garage had set them for good.
Underinflation, almost always. A soft tyre bows in the middle so the shoulders carry the load, and the shoulders are least able to shed heat. On a heavy car it goes quickly. Alignment gives you one edge worn rather than both.
No. Above the placard figure the centre of the tread does all the work, the ride turns brittle and wet grip drops off. The published figures already account for the weight of the car. Use the laden figure when the car is genuinely laden.
If the car was specified with one it is not really optional. A reinforced or XL casing carries a higher load index at a given pressure, and dropping to a standard casing changes what the tyre is rated to carry. We match or better the index.
Yes, provided the size, load index and speed rating stay the same. Those figures belong to the car and the load, not to the make of tyre. How a given pressure feels can change slightly, since casings differ in stiffness.
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