We all know that too much pressure wears the middle of the tires more than the outsides, and too little pressure wears the outsides more than the middle but how does it actually effect the rate of wear?

Question is, with too much pressure for example, does the middle wear at the normal rate while the outsides of the tire are spared? Or does the middle wear at an accelerated rate due to having the same force on a smaller contact patch?

If the 2nd were the case, then would having wider tires (on appropriate sized rims) actually lengthen tire life?


[Modified by DSC240sx, 9:11 PM 3/9/2003]

 

I don't think you can have any more or less overall wear- the amount of stress put on the tire doesn't have anything to do with tire pressure. It's just in how it's distributed.