Rotating tires

[Zfestiva]

I want to rotate the tires on my 91 Festiva. The owners manual says to move the left rear to the right front wheel, then right front to right rear, right rear to left front and left front to right rear. The new Haynes manual I bought says just swap the front and rear tires keeping them on the same side.

Which is best, or does it really mattter?

Art

[Dave G]

I remember when radial tires first came out they said to only swap them front to back. I think the theory was that the cords would take a "set" over time, and reversing that would make the cords loosen up. But I don't think that proved to be correct, and now there is no such recommendation.

[5.0zone]

^^^What Dave said.
Now they say it doesn't matter. Unless its a directional tread.

[Zfestiva]

Why I am rotating

When I bought the car about 9 months ago, all four tires were almost brand new. Recently they seem to have started "humming".

With cars in the past, rotating the tires usually solved that within a few weeks after doing the rotation.

Thanks for the input.

Art

[FestYboy]

for FWD cars, swap front to rear. if not then you could cause a pull in the steering. that thing about the cords in the tires is true still and i've had to swap tires because of that reason.... though i did learn that for RWD cars, that first rotation you listed is correct and should be used unless there is a difference in tire sizes front to rear.

[Damkid]

the way i learned how to rotate tires is the drive tires get moved to either the front or back depending on front wheel drive or rear and crossed and the non-drive tires stay on the same sides but to drive tires

example: on a festy,

the front left tire gets moved to the right rear,
the front right tire gets moved to the left rear
the right rear get moved to the front right
the left rear gets moved to the front left

i've seen quite a few garages do it this way,

i'm assuming that "cords would set" after some time like what Dave G said and that would be why the non-drive tires would stay on the same side, to keep the same rotation, and by crossing the drive tires to the non-drive, it would give that chance for them to set, like i said though i'm assuming, don't know for sure