Part-worn tyres

When the time (the season) comes to buy new tyres, a motorist today has a fairly wide choice of ways to buy them, for practically any budget. Buying part-worn tyres often looks like a perfectly sensible way out when the budget is tight. Can you buy tyres that have already been used, and what should you bear in mind when you do? Below we will try to set it all out clearly: when buying part-worn tyres makes sense and when it does not, and (most important) how to buy part-worn tyres correctly, what to look at and how to judge whether they are fit for use.

General advice: buying part-worn tyres is, in any case, a fairly risky business. Even if the external signs linked to below do not turn up any serious (critical) faults in the tyres on offer, that does not mean there are none. So, in most cases, you are better off not buying part-worn tyres from a seller you do not know, and especially not at the market.

Remember that the condition of the tyres has a substantial, direct effect on road safety. That is why buying tyres, particularly part-worn ones, is a very responsible undertaking, and such a purchase needs to be approached thoroughly and with full seriousness. Measure twice, cut once: a rule that fits the purchase of part-worn car tyres perfectly.

Sadly, the reality is that the average motorist’s budget does not always stretch to buying new tyres, so we will try to give a few pointers on how to buy good part-worn tyres correctly, what to look at and by what criteria to judge the degree of wear and the fitness of part-worn tyres for further use. In any case, there is no rushing a purchase like this: you need to choose thoughtfully, and you will most likely need to look at more than one or two sets of tyres.

Below are the main points and questions that come up when buying part-worn tyres (click the heading or the picture to read the details).

How and where do you buy part-worn tyres?

Where do dealers at the car market get their part-worn tyres from? What questions should you ask a seller over the phone to save time and avoid looking at options that are obviously unfit? The answers to these and other questions may seem obvious, but they will help you organise the process of searching for, inspecting and buying part-worn tyres properly.

Buying part-worn tyres is, in general, a fairly dubious and risky business. Even if you follow all the advice on this page, there is still a certain risk of buying tyres that are, in fact, not fit for use. So before you make the final decision to buy part-worn tyres, weigh up all the “pros” and “cons” carefully, and look at the current offers on the market for new tyres too: in most cases, buying new budget tyres makes more sense than buying more expensive but part-worn tyres at the same price.

If you have decided to buy part-worn tyres anyway, read this article carefully before you start negotiating with the seller: it may help you avoid wasting your money. Either way, there is no point rushing to buy part-worn tyres: the time spent searching for them and checking them will be paid back many times over by their long and (I hope) trouble-free use afterwards.