Driving long distance with one of four tyres advisory

Your tyres at the time of the MOT are legal  – the advisory is a prod to keep an eye on them  because there is a chance they will become illegal in the foreseeable future. You are fine to drive .   Whatever your MOT says it is your responsibility to ensure the car is roadworthy; do a few doughnuts in the Tesco car park and the tyres will become illegal.

I tried to find data on this and couldn’t . Crossclimates are an all round compromise tyre, so ‘possibly’ could be worse at braking in the summer than a good summer tyre

Possibly…. I’d say definitely are. In a perfect world you’d have different tyres for all seasons and if I had the money and space so would I. Heck, maybe even some summers with a few mm of tread for dry, and then some summer wets as well. How far do you take it.

I know that kind of goes against what I said earlier about not squeezing an extra tenner’s worth out of each corner and changing at about 3mm but that’s the reality. The compromise of an all seasons in the warm/dry is way less than the benefit in the cold and wet, and that’s a trade I’m willing to make.

do a few doughnuts in the Tesco car park and the tyres will become illegal.

I do doughnuts in the supermarket car park, but only because if I take them home then I don’t get to eat all four and have to share them with the kids.

I’d drive them.

I suspect the advisory is one of two/three things.

1. They’ll need replacing before next MOT.
2. The tyres are significantly different Left/Right, your tracking might be out.
3. The tyres are significantly different across the tread, tracking might be out.

I’d be very surprised if the condition of the tyres will make any material difference to anything for one “long drive” this weekend. Unless you’re doing a dash to southern coast of Greece, 5 up, and then back again for work on Monday.

Tbh front wheel outer edge wear is mostly from nailing it around roundabouts a little too aggressively. I’d only be looking at tracking if the middles were still relatively unworn

Just the fact that the OP is asking the question kinda implies that they normally have no idea how much tread are on their tyres and can I guess that the OP usually relies on a garage etc to tell them they need replacing?

Anyway, now you know, and imagine having that accident in the rain and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel knowing that your non-action may have caused it?

Of course there is then tyre pressures. A lot of garages appear incable of setting pressures correctly for the car, so you could end up on brand new tyres which are massively over inflated and therefore not working properly

Does long distance or short distance make a difference?

As it’s summer and it’s just the outer edge, I wouldn’t change them as long as the center tread is 3mm.  Just drive appropriately if its wet and check them again after your long drive.  Most tyres I have wear down to 2mm on the side and the middle is still at 3-4mm (plenty safe enough).

If worn unevenly you might want to get tracking looked at. Or perhaps you live in Milton Keynes.

I think you’ll be fine, unless it gets wet, and then you’d have to be extremely unlucky to have a problem, especially with the wear just on the outside.

Having said that I take no chances with tyres and just changed 4 that had less than 10000 miles and were under 3 years old as they were starting to get a weird cracking in the treads. Garage said they don’t make em like they used to. First time I ever drove on a motorway I had a rear tyre blowout at 70 and since then I’ve never skimped, they’re the only thing between you and the road.

Most tyres I have wear down to 2mm on the side and the middle is still at 3-4mm (plenty safe enough).

Can I suggest that you invest in an accurate pressure gauge? If both edges, that’s a sign of under inflation

Most tyres I have wear down to 2mm on the side and the middle is still at 3-4mm (plenty safe enough).

Can I suggest that you invest in an accurate pressure gauge? If both edges, that’s a sign of under inflation

I check my tyres every 2-3 weeks with a good pressure gauge.  Some cars tend to wear the tyre edges if you corner hard, whatever you do.  It’s had a full geometry check too.

Good god there are some doom and gloom fannies on this site.

I’m always impressed with the mileage STW can eek out of a worn tyre WWSTWD? Thread

Of course dont, forget to change your brake pads whilst your at it for some premium race pads, dont want your braking performance to be sub optimal.

There are people out there driving on brand new tyres that come bottom in every test. Their tyres are the worst money can buy. Their comparative performance is woeful.

They are 100% legal and will sail through an MOT

Does long distance or short distance make a difference?

Southern Greece and back might, it’s near enough a 5000 mile round trip…

Just to put it into perspective, i’d be permitted to go out onto the track here in a test car with tyres more worn than that and lap repeatedly at 250+kph. I’d soon find out if the tracking was ok.

Is it too soon to ask What tyres for the Peloponnese?

2.7mm is fine, and fairly normal for cars to wear the outer edges of the front tyres, especially if they do mostly twisty, non-motorway miles.

Having said that, at some point tyres get old and hard. IIRC the MOT limit is 10 years (but that might only apply to minibuses/buses) but I’ve had 8 year old tyres feel sketchy as **** so had them replaced.

So depends on what your plans are with the car. If you plan to keep it a while but not indefinitely (i.e. another 8+ years at 2000miles a year)  then just get them replaced now, you’ll have to at some point anyway, and you’ll get more of the benefit.

Anyway, now you know, and imagine having that accident in the rain and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel knowing that your non-action may have caused it?

How far do you take that argument?

Why would you ever drive in the rain, and imagine having that accident in the rain and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel

Why would you not replace all your brake pads with EBC Greenstuffs and imagine having that accident and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel

Would you not replace all your tyres at 6mm, 1mm above the European winter standard to give you a margin for safety, and imagine having that accident in the rain and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel knowing that your non-action may have caused it?

Why would you not drive an M1A1 main battle tank*, and imagine having that accident in the rain and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel knowing that your non-action may have caused it?

Why would you ever all get in the same car, you should all drive individually to minimize the risk of leaving your kids orphaned, and imagine having that accident in the rain and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel knowing that your non-action may have caused it?

Why would you ever drive (this is actually the least rhetorical)?

*Or a Toyota Landcruiser.

When my fronts are down to around 3mm or just below I can feel them squirming going through puddles at 50-60mph.  Which is why I never run them down to 1.6mm.

I agree with the sugestion above – wait until October then change to all seasons. Though unless the current tyres are all seasons you would need to buy 4.

“You should not mix all season and summer tyres. If you are changing your tyres to all season, you should put all season tyres on all four wheels. Equally, you should not mix all season tyres with winter tyres or summer tyres with winter tyres. Always fit the same type of tyre on all four wheels.”

https://www.goodyear.eu/en_gb/consumer/why-goodyear/winter-driving-all-season-uk.html

…and then there is the other key factor in all this that no one has mentioned so far is the skill/experience and reaction time of the driver, and whether they like to pick their nose, use their mobile phone whilst driving. Will probably have more of an impact on stopping distances than the tyre tread depth.

I’ve just changed a pair – Cross Climates again obviously. 😉 They were down to under 3mm on the edges so they went. Experience tells me that below 3mm a Summer storm can result in aquaplaning even with the fast draining surfaces used these days on motorways.

My Winters (Michelin Alpin) get changed at 4-5mm or when they start to develop fine cracks, Winter tyres seem to age faster than Cross Climates or Summer tyres.

  Though unless the current tyres are all seasons you would need to buy 4.

I don’t disagree with the principle of your point, but I ended up with Continental Winter tyres on the front and Firestone summer tyres (i.e. not ditchfinders, but hardly premium) on the rear of my Berlingo.

Now considering the Berlingo rear suspension is about as advanced as a medieval catapult (torsion bar on a beam axle) but less refined. It still understeered round cold wet roundabouts like nothing else I’ve ever driven and emergency stops required as much wishful thinking as brake pedal pressure.

So the difference between Summer and Winter tyres, let alone halfway options isn’t enough to overcome that imbalance (maybe best not to try it the other way round with the ‘good’ tyres on the rear and amplify the issue though).

Crack on, you’ll be reet.

Surely the correct answer is it’s time for new bike?

Advisory means that you need to keep an eye on them, as it’s thought that if you wait till next time you have an MOT you might well be driving around on illegal and dangerous tyres.

“But what if you crash?” Well, if you’re that worried about crashing then why even drive? Are you really stopping your car millimeters away from a dangerous accident? Perhaps look at the way you drive. Your insurance is for a legal car, of course you’re insured if you get “advisory” from the MOT garage (but the advise is to keep an eye on them – you won’t be insured if you’ve worn them to be illegal).

I got an advisory on tyres one year, didn’t change them for the whole year and got another advisory the following year. The reason being I don’t push the tyres hard and do limited mileage through the year.

Yes, tyres are an important safety aspect of the car and I won’t go waiting till the very limit of their life, but they’re also expensive and from almost the moment you start using them they’ll be degrading. Just be sensible and drive your journey. Drive many journeys, but check your tyres regularly and start saving for a new set.

but I’ve had 8 year old tyres feel sketchy as **** so had them replaced.

This is interesting, I’ve found that old tyres get really noisy rather than noticing any performance degradation (I’m not one for ‘making progress’) but yeah, they can be knackered plenty before the tread is worn out.

Would seem great value though if you had a crash where stopping sooner would have prevented it!

…

There are people out there driving on brand new tyres that come bottom in every test. Their tyres are the worst money can buy. Their comparative performance is woeful.

They are 100% legal and will sail through an MOT

This. I’d rather have good tyres with ‘advisory’ than brand new surface-to-hedge missiles.  I’ve had tyres listed as advisory on a service which were still listed as advisory on the following one.

The legal limit is one where beyond which it would be deemed to be unsafe to use.  Ipso facto, 1.61mm should be fine.  I would be surprised if there wasn’t a degree of safety margin built into that limit to start with.

I stand by my earlier statement.  Changing tyres in the middle of summer with almost double the minimum tread still left on them at their most worn edges is madness.  What do they measure in the centre of the tread pattern?

Based on that I would not even think about changing them until 12 months time.

I was thinking the opposite… the new tyres are possibly going to be the last tyres going on such a low milage car… so might as well buy soon and buy quality.

…surface-to-hedge missiles…

I like that, I’ve always referred to them as Bandvulk Ditchfinders, but I’m having yours for future.

Madame Edukator was driving  the M1, cautiously with plenty of distance to the car in front, below limit, in a deluge. The car in front then started rotating, she slowed gently and drove around it using the hard shoulder. That’s the difference between just legal tyres and 3mm+

If the tyres have 1.6mm on them, they are legal, and that’s that.

There is a difference between legal and safe in all conditions as well outlined by a number of posts above.

Why take the risk? As an answer to the original question, I would be comfortable driving on the tyres for the journey suggested but would  be looking to change them quite soon.

I have had MOT advisories on tyres

Nearside Front Tyre worn close to legal limit/worn on edge 3mm (5.2.3 (e))

I changed them at about 2.5mm before the autumn that same year. In Germany the recommendation is to change at 3mm

The car in front then started rotating, she slowed gently and drove around it using the hard shoulder. That’s the difference between just legal tyres and 3mm+

Amazing skills to do that at the same time as assessing the tread depth on the other car from a distance in a deluge.

sounds to me like there is plenty left and changing them would be wasteful, both financially and environmentally.

We dont all drive rep mobile Audi and Beemers on the ragged edge of grip everywhere we go.

Anyway, now you know, and imagine having that accident in the rain and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel knowing that your non-action may have caused it?

how do you sleep at night thinking of these hypothetical nonsense’s ?

FWIW, i’ve had cars aquaplane with new (under 100 km) tyres on. Maybe i need new tyres?

(It was planned, i had to drive into increasingly deep “puddles” at a variety of speeds.)

It also happens fairly often on my commute, Sweden doesn’t use the fast draining tarmac, as it isn’t very durable against the weather we get here, so you occasionally get standing water.

how do you sleep at night thinking of these hypothetical nonsense’s ?

Presumably they don’t, what if the house caught fire and you weren’t awake to stop it and someone (you love) getting injured/killed – how would you feel knowing that your non-action may have caused it?

Got to love a STW car tyre thread. Almost as good as a speeding thread.

I like that, I’ve always referred to them as Bandvulk Ditchfinders, but I’m having yours for future.

I literally just made it up, I was going to write ‘ditchfinders’ until I saw someone else already had.

Cougar

The legal limit is one where beyond which it would be deemed to be unsafe to use.  Ipso facto, 1.61mm should be fine.  I would be surprised if there wasn’t a degree of safety margin built into that limit to start with.

I stand by my earlier statement.  Changing tyres in the middle of summer with almost double the minimum tread still left on them at their most worn edges is madness.  What do they measure in the centre of the tread pattern?

Yes, legal, but why would you want to get near the legal minimum?  TBH driving is probably the most dangerous thing my family do, so I want the best tyres 24/7.

Unfortunately that’s not practical, so what is the best point to change from a cost/benefit perspective?

I looked into it and my recollection* is that especially in the wet, braking/aquaplaning performance degrades slowly down to 3mm or so, then drops quite rapidly.

Therefore my conclusion is that the sensible point to change the tyre is around that point. You’ve had ~80% of their maximum wear, but they still perform okay.

*please don’t make me hunt for the graph..!