The penny tire tread test can give you a very basic idea of whether your tires are okay or whether you need to replace them. It’s important to understand that although Abe isn’t being dishonest, he’s also not being 100 percent accurate. RI Automotive explains that this test doesn’t measure the tread left on your vehicle’s tires down to the inches or millimeters so you know whether you are driving legally or illegally. Your tires must have 1/16-of-an-inch of tread left on each of them for you to be driving legally in Florida.
The Penny Test for Tire Tread
If you are looking for a guesstimate, go ahead and grab a penny that shows President Lincoln’s profile clearly. Make sure your vehicle is parked in a well-lit area and secured so that it doesn’t roll. Get down on your hands and knees and inspect the tread on each tire thoroughly, looking for areas where the tread looks as if it has worn down in strips, patches, circles, feathers, or scallops.
If your tire tread is wearing down unevenly, you have a problem with your wheel alignment or wheel balance, or you do not have the right air pressure in each tire. It’s important to address this issue right away to avoid continual uneven tread wear that reduces the life of your tires. If the tread looks fine, turn President Lincoln’s profile toward you and insert the penny between the rows of the tread.
To read the penny, you must have President Lincoln’s head covered or uncovered by the tire tread. If all or a portion of his head is covered by the tread on your tires, you have more than 1/16-of-an-inch of tire tread left. If you can see the top of honest Abe’s head, your tire tread is too low and you need to replace your tires as soon as possible.
More Accurate Forms of Measurement
All of this being said, a more accurate way to measure the tread that is left on each of your vehicle’s tires is to purchase a tire tread gauge and use that instead of a penny. This will give you the exact measurements of the tread on each tire, which is a much better way of knowing approximately how much life you have left on each one. We can also accurately measure your tire tread depth here at our shop.
RI Automotive is in Tampa, FL, and we’d be happy to inspect your automobile’s tires. Schedule a tire inspection with us today.
