The 5-tire PERFECT rotation schedule for MAX tread life and value.

[Easy-v]

I am not sure how to respond to this, in my 30'ish years of driving 4x4's the steering tires always wear faster unless you are doing burnouts or something. Front two carry more weight, get "scrubbed" against the ground in turning, weight transfers forward in braking so front tires do 70-80% of braking force which affects the tire life. Lastly, weight and heat are both higher in the front end.

I noticed in another thread you had posted this "right rear" comment and that front's should outlast the back but every comment after was agreeing with the dealerships/tire shops and general experience of drivers that the fronts always wear faster. In researching I also have no idea were you got this right rear wheel only thing. Broncos absolutely have a differential that sends power equally to the rear tires. I hate to just call someone wrong but maybe you could point to a source where you got this info? I certainly can't find anything to make me understand what you meant by that.

The weight of the engine rests on that front axle…

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[Hemisfear]

I've never had an issue just rotating tires.

When I would swap between different sets of tires though, I would usually need to do a relearn. Maybe different brands of TPMS or something, I dunno.

Me neither, pressure values are always quick to update as well!

 

[87-Z28]

Rotate every 1/2 mile and choose any random ass pattern you can come up with after a twelve pack. Tire wear will be guaranteed to be perfectly even and consistent. No fun on longer trips, except the 12 pack part.

 

[Fordified1]

Right rear is your main drive tire. If the fronts are somehow getting more wear than your rear I would think you have an alignment issue.

I use the rotation others have posted, where the spare goes to the right rear.

Right rear is not the main drive tire but is the tire that slips first without a locked or limited slip differential because the driveshaft is trying to lift the right rear during acceleration. Ask any drag racer.
The fronts wear first because they do the turning and geometry is a compromise and never perfect through the articulation cycles. And yes a poor alignment makes that even worse. I screwed up and didn’t rotate my mud tires often enough and the left front started cupping before I did the first rotation. Alignment was as perfect as one can be in a non perfect world.

 

[AZ_Liberty]

Right rear is not the main drive tire but is the tire that slips first without a locked or limited slip differential because the driveshaft is trying to lift the right rear during acceleration. Ask any drag racer.
The fronts wear first because they do the turning and geometry is a compromise and never perfect through the articulation cycles. And yes a poor alignment makes that even worse. I screwed up and didn’t rotate my mud tires often enough and the left front started cupping before I did the first rotation. Alignment was as perfect as one can be in a non perfect world.

Right rear wears because Bronco has an open rear. Which is pretty ridiculous if you think about it. My Mustang has better performance on a dirt road when the Bronco is in 2WD.

If you do a lot of high speed cornering you get wear on the outside corners of the fronts, but the primary wear is on the drive tires.

Drive a vehicle with staggered wheels/tires. (thus can't/don't rotate). You will replace the rears twice as often as the fronts.

 

[crenca]

On all of our Chevy/GMC 2500/3500 HD 2WD work trucks, the outside edge of the front right (passenger) tire always wore out way faster than anything else. We always guessed it had something to do with the rear right being the dominant drive wheel and the truck resisting right hand turns a bit more than left, but I dunno. This was a consistent thing across 20+ model years of trucks in our fleet.

Right rear is not the main drive tire but is the tire that slips first without a locked or limited slip differential because the driveshaft is trying to lift the right rear during acceleration. Ask any drag racer.

A few things are being conflated here. As the OP pointed out, the Bronco has open differentials (unless they are electro-mecahnically locked with the "hero" button), which mechanically distributes torque across both wheels on the axle evenly, even when the wheel speed differentiates (thus the reason they are called "differentials"), for example in a turn (i.e. the outside wheel has to turn faster - because the arc it is on is longer - vs. the inside wheel in the turn).

The right rear tire often spins first (i.e. looses traction and "smokes" during a burnout, whether intentional or not) not due to the properties of an open differential, but because that corner is unloaded - has less weight on the tire, and thus less traction. Why? Because of the rotational force of the engine, through the drivetrain, unloads the right rear side - assuming your engine spins in the traditional direction (clockwise viewed from front, counter-clockwise when viewed from the rear). In other words, the engine/driveline torque wants to "twist" the axle such that the driver rear is loaded more, which gives it more traction (traction is a function of friction - more weight means more friction), meaning the passenger rear will typically break loose first.

Back when the typical rear drive car had soft suspensions, and particularly when frames could be twisted just from engine torque alone several inches (particularly high HP "muscle cars" of the 1960's through 1990's), right rear wear was more of an issue. Most vehicles today are stiff enough, and the suspensions robust enough, that other factors are more of an issue. Pickups are the exception because they a lightly loaded in the rear when they are not carrying a load in the bed or on the hitch.

Our Bronco's with their turbo engines have significantly less low end torque then a V8 (gas or diesel) equipped pickup, but if you do get the rear end to 'burnout' it will still be the passenger if your in a straight line or turning left. If your turning right the weight shift of the vehicle lean will probably overwhelm the driveline twist effect and cause driver rear to break loose first.

If you have it, just put your driveline in AWD (i.e. "4A") all the time and this particular rear wear pattern goes away.

 

[majorhavok]

If you have it, just put your driveline in AWD (i.e. "4A") all the time and this particular rear wear pattern goes away.

Chris, great comment and explanation. After seeing Liberty's comment a couple times here I was googling trying to learn something and the google AI agreed with him. Source cited was: "some bronco6g users reported faster wear on the rear tires. " The commenter in both links was Liberty AZ.

hahahaha.. I shit you not.

I DID find others with similar experiences as Liberty on tire wear so a lot depends on driving style, preferred driving mode, towing etc. Also, I didn't initially think about people with different trim levels. I just assumed that everyone had the Wildtrak locking everything capabilities and all the modes/features but should have known better. Cheers

 

[Fordified1]

Chris, great comment and explanation. After seeing Liberty's comment a couple times here I was googling trying to learn something and the google AI agreed with him. Source cited was: "some bronco6g users reported faster wear on the rear tires. " The commenter in both links was Liberty AZ.

hahahaha.. I shit you not.

I DID find others with similar experiences as Liberty on tire wear so a lot depends on driving style, preferred driving mode, towing etc. Also, I didn't initially think about people with different trim levels. I just assumed that everyone had the Wildtrak locking everything capabilities and all the modes/features but should have known better. Cheers

When I was 16-20-something, I definitely wore the rear tires out much faster than the front. And the right rear on my parents Buick with an open diff. As a fully matured adult who doesn’t like buying tires or gas, my front tires wear faster. So yes driving style has a lot to do with it.

 

[Notmattwong]

I did this today and found out my jack lifts the front just barely high enough to get the wheels off. I also learned it’s a workout to lug around these 85ish pound wheels and tires.

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