the flyin' scotsman

I just picked up my new Carrera III rims that are fitted with Bridgestone Potenzas.

A quick look at one of the rears I cant seem to locate the directional arrow or whatever they use as an indicator of rotation.

Had Michelins on my 928s for over 10 years and theyre easy to read........must be the diff in French and Japanese?

ThetaTau87

What kind of Potenza? Bridgestone makes a dozen or more different models with that name. They could be unidirectional.

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/bridge...tone-tires.jsp

BTW, what did you pay for the Carrera IIIs? What condition? I'll likely buy a set in the future and want to keep tabs on what they're going for.

aviography

You should be able to tell by looking at the tread pattern, looking from the back of the car, the pattern should be inverted V, I.e. like ^

WyattsRide

I believe if you got the RE-11's, they are unidirectional.

Mine were all mounted like this. The offset grooves to the inside.

FredR

Malcolm,

if the tread pattern is asymmetrical and has an "inside" and an "outside" then they are invariably bi-directional. If the pattern is symmetrical then invariably the fitment will be unidirectional [think I got that the right way round!].

Michelin Cup tires for instance are asymmetrical and can be fitted on either side irrespective of rotational direction but they must be fitted with the correct side to the interior flange. Thus if you cannot see a rotational arrow I suspect your tires will follow this logic.

Regards

Fred

FredR

Rick,

Given your tires are asymmetrical design and unidirectional [i.e. can only be fitted to rotate in a single direction] does that mean there is one specifically for the left hand side and one for the right hand side fitment?

I have only seen that once with a Pirelli tire - a "Rosso Corso" model [I think].

Regards

Fred

WyattsRide

Fred,
My understanding of these Potenzas is that as long as the tires are mounted correctly on the wheel (ie. the water displacing grooves to the inside, dry surface tread to the outside) I can rotate the tires/wheels from left to right without a problem. Being that I have different size tires/wheels front and rear (S4 wheels) I can't cross rotate. I could, if all four tires/wheels were the same size.

I could be wrong about this though. This is just what I understood after buying the tires.

Maybe "unidirectional" is not the correct term for these? Could be bidirectional?....I'm confused.

uncre8tv

Bi-directional = they can go on either side. The tires pictured above appear to be bi-directional (can go on either side) but asymmetrical (there is an "inside" and "outside" to the tire.)

Uni-directional = they can only go on one side. They have one ('uni') direction they were intended to rotate. These will invariably have a rather obvious arrow on them. uni-directional tread is fairly common in S4 tire sizes.

I have an S4 (different wheel sizes front/back) with uni-directional Kellys on them, so no rotation worries for me

the flyin' scotsman

thx folks.

They are Potenza RE050As..........I'll post a pic of the tread soon..........out in the unheated -23c garage

They are stamped inside/outside

FredR

Malcolm,

That explains why they have no directional arrows on them- it does not matter.

Does your camera still work at minus 23c? In fact does anything work at that temperature? Gas molecules almost stop moving at that temperature! Temps here have now dropped to plus 23C- ha ha!

928 now running nicely once more!

Regards

Fred

the flyin' scotsman

+23c is a good summer high for us Fred .......we have a long frigid winter to go........wait until Feb then we'll really be bouncing off the walls.

Good to know it doesn't matter.........thanks