Generally speaking.....2 causes of tire wear that people are speaking of.....

Wheel alignment issues...
Tire inflation issues (low pressure, especially of low "profile" tires).

 

Another possibility might be overly fast cornering? I live in the mountains and most of my driving is curvy mountain roads. I know that on my last couple of SUV's I was wearing the outside edges of the front tires alot from- I believe- cornering too fast through turns. Lots of weight on the outside edge of the front leading tire. I just rotated 'em. The tire life was definitely shorter cuz there's no way to "even out" the wear, of course, but I just lived with it. Thoughts on this?

 

You should rotate your tires at least every 5to6000 miles to keep the tire wear down.I rotate mine every 3000 miles. The last vehicle I did that to I got 80,000 miles out of the tires.It was a 95 4 door S-10 Blazer.I know its not an HHR but you get the idea. Also the alignment, is never 100% correct from the factory.I have done alot of alignments on newer Chevy vehicles and found all of them with toe and camber issues.Almost all car manufactures do not align.their vehicles 100% due to shipment and the dealership is not going to worry about checking them they will just wait for the customer to come back with a tire wear complaint, then maybe correct the problem correctly. To align. the rear on an HHR it is done by using shims behind the drums. When I lowered mine I did an alignment and did find the rear out but not bad enough to put shims in.They can be a real pain in the butt to do. Anyone taking yours back to the dealer for alignment issues make sure they give you a print out of the align. before and after.Rotating tires At 10,000 miles yes you will see tire wear on the inner and outer of the front tires due to turning the wheels, you may also see feathering in the rear again due to the lack of rotation.

 

You could run more camber,less caster,tires with a lower side aspect ratio.

 

I have never had any luck with Firestone/Bridgestone or Uniroyals. I avoid them if possible. Only 7000 km on the car, so a few miles left before a change, unless, of course, I can afford some cool rims sooner.

Jim

 

I've got the factory 16's.

 

I had to get a tire replaced last week, so let the shop put 2 Coopers on front, they checked the alignment , cuz there was signs of wear on outer edge, Tow was out ...... 26k app miles