Tires: tire rotation, rotating tires, tread depth

Question
is there a federal regulation which bans shops from rotating
tires if they're below a certain tread depth

Answer
Susie,

There is a federal regulation that the tires must be 2/32nds of an inch to be in service.  This is sometimes interpreted to mean any location on the tire, but the regulation is far from clear on the subject.

However, there are many court cases where what a tire shop did or didn't do was called into question, so many shops are taking a conservative approach to these sorts of subjects.

So if a tire shop refused to rotate your tires it could be for a number of reasons:

- They saw that the tires were below the minimum requirement.  Since they can not force you to buy tires, their only alternative was to refuse to service your vehicle.

- They saw that the tread depth remaining on the front was significantly less than what was on the rear.  Hydroplaning resisitance is a function of tread depth remaining and the smart thing to do is to put the deepest tires on the rear.  So they may have refused to do a rotation not only to keep your car as safe as possible, but also to protect themselves from litigation.

Hope this helps.