tire tread

This may be a dumb question but I see with tires for sale they say there's lets say 60 % tread left how do you get a number like this? Do you measure the tread?

I suppose there may be a way to measure but I don't know it.
To me a 60% tire should have about 60% of service life left in it.
But that doesn't only include tread depth.
It also includes cracking and checking.
A guy could have a tire that had 90% tread but if it was old, cracked and dry it might only be a 25% tire.
At least that's how I would rate one if I was selling it.

ultradog has a good way to look at it and I would agree but I think most go by tread and guesstimate percentage of tread/lugs.

A used tire is worth 15.00 tops,15.00 more to mount and balance. At 30.00 a tire(no warranty at all) new starts to look pretty cheap.

Nick.......would you believe that there are tire-micrometers? About the size of a regular shirt pocket pencil gauge. Just put the flat on the tread with the little round dipstick down into the tread. Measure and lie. Modern tires have built-in 1/16" wear gauge. when the bar show its time to re-tire. I routinely gitt 100K miles on my 3/4T Dodge Cummins Diesel tires. While I run semi-empty, I religiously watch tire pressure. 55F, 35R (empty) When I haul an 8000# trailer on bumper hitch, I up'em to 65 all around. ALWAYS use yer OWN tire pressure gauge, do NOT trust the one on the hoze. ......the tired Dell

Well the used tire dealers never really learned about percentages because their idea of 50% is more like 25 actual percent

(quoted from post at 18:32:05 01/15/15) This may be a dumb question but I see with tires for sale they say there's lets say 60 % tread left how do you get a number like this? Do you measure the tread?

Click to expand...

No, it's a guess or an outright lie.

Roughly translated:

95% tread = half worn out
75% tread = you can tell that the tire has lugs
50% tread = you can tell that the tire HAD lugs at some point
25% tread = they look like racing slicks

$30 for a used tire (even mounted) would depend on the tire. I know I just purchased a set of new winter tires, for about $60 delivered, but had to pay to mount/balance. Wal-Mart will mount and balance with lifetime balance for $12/tire - which is not that bad considering, and if the guy doing the work does not ruin the rim like happened to me once. Obviously he had no clue how to use the equipment as the clear coat was gone all the way around the rim on all 4. Why I did not make Wal Mart buy me a new set of rims is beyond me, but for some reason I let it slide that day. If/When I buy a used tire I try to negotiate a price, and I figure if a tire shop is selling a used tire it is highly unlikely they paid anything for it, and anything they make is profit. Many years ago I did TV repair (no such thing today), I loved it when I could sell used parts off a junk tv, as it was pure profit, and usually sold for half what the new part would list for, and usually just as good. About a month ago I had 4 tires balanced, and they were off the vehicle, and already mounted. $40 to balance 4 tires, and I thought that was way over priced considering it took him all of about 15 minutes.

Yep, the cheapest micrometer is old Abes head on the penny.

Mark

My rub on tires is the amount of tread vs the amount of other parts of the tire that usually don't wear out like the tread and help in driving the cost.

Been looking at different tire brands and different wheel sizes in the non-off road, hot dog arena. The ones that run on the highway and don't make a lot of noise.

Besides the difference in tire compounds the various mfgrs. use, there seems to be a physical element also that dictates just how much tread is on the carcass. Like 20" are limited to 12/32" while dropping down to the standard size (not optional as I have) for my truck is 17" and the tread is 16/32 with a tread wear rating of 600 vs 300.........but the bigguns with the flashy chrome skins are pretty and that's why I bought them. Guess I'll just have to "suck it up" and go with the flow.

Mark

Thanks everyone every time I see that I always wondered how they got that number