Front wheel alignment?

[gordon stephenson]

My Touareg is due an MOT, Just glancing around the tyres they all looked legal,but I would need a new set before winter, On closer examination the drivers side tyre is rubbed off all round about 40mm wide on the inside edge,All other tyres are evenly worn right across. What could be the reason for this? Wouldn't tracking effect both front tyres?

 

[BrokenBiker]

my megane did the same with passenger wheel until i had new.tyres on front, they both seem.to wearing evenly now

 

[fixerupper]

I had that on my Mazda Truck , we did the tracking and it did'nt cure it .. but this year we replaced the shockers, bearings ,trackrod ends etc,( they were all badly worn the roads here knock the life out of stearing and suspension and it seems fine now) ... so some thing must have been out ...jeff...

 

[gordon stephenson]

Im taiking it in for 4 new tyres tomorrow, Free alignment check thrown in with the price, The tyres on at the moment have given good milage,so it must have taken a while for the tyre to wear like that, Fingers crossed that tracking cures it.

 

[normspanners]

Yes tracking usually effects both fronts, it can be two different makeup of tyres reacting against each other or even the camber being out if you can get it on some flat concrete hold a spirit level up to the wheel and just measure the gap to the top of the tyres, check both ie against 'the good side' they should be within 0-5mm of each other that is about .5 deg
I had one on a merc, checked everything nothing wrong, went on for about a year, checked and triple checked then the guy then brought it in for a service and said could he be dropped off at home, so he drove he lived in a cul de sac, he drove to the end, full lock powered round the turning space at the end and pulled up outside his house ready for me to drive off I said do you do that maneuver very often, he said every day I replied that then is where your rubber is, the tread off the front tyre , is on the road back there!! mercs have a massive amount of caster. which on full lock puts the strut and wheel over at an angle, causing the tyre scrub.
I got him to stand and watch and i drove the car he could plainly see the tyre bending and scrubbing and see a faint mark on the road problem solved!!

 

[normspanners]

Ps ask if you can watch the tracking being checked as a lot of places/tyre fitters havnt a clue what they are doing and can make things worse ! the usual thing is to stick a young lad on it.
tracking does not just go out it is caused by something.
my mate had his tracking checked free then adjusted ?,----- 4 times untill I had to do it in the end, and the adjustment went back to where the original witness marks where to within a mm

 

[normspanners]

If it has had a btm joint, drive shaft boot or wheel brg done that is a good excuse for the camber/tracking to be out if they havnt realigned the joints correctly

 

[normspanners]

so some thing must have been out

Yeah the out back roads, I have just come back from rhodes and had two hire cars all I can say was, the steering was a little vague on both!

 

[rtbcomp]

........s a lot of places/tyre fitters havnt a clue what they are doing and can make things worse ! the usual thing is to stick a young lad on it.
......

+1

I took a SIII landy in to a commercial tyre place for tracking. They refused to do it because they weren't sure which rod to adjust! At least they were honest.

 

[normspanners]

They refused to do it because they weren't sure which rod to adjust! At least they were honest.

and how basic is a sIII!!!!! it worries me sometimes.
We took a mx5 to our local place coz I was very busy and it needed to go to goodwood festival, for mazda cars, it had had a total rebuild and wanted complete 4 wheel laser alignment.
I said it needed to be correct and left it, well it came back i had a quick look round it by eye, I could tell them exactly what it was doing caster camber etc etc within a few mm by eye but that car was cm's out,I took it back they said oh we put the wrong settings in the computer ! ha bolicks
it wasnt even close again a young lad without a clue, didnt even know to move the vehicle after adjusting and rechecking etc etc. a total joke.

 

[W4yne]

Looks like the drivers side wheel is towing in Gordon. It's usually the outside of my front near side tyre that I wear out, probably due to taking roundabouts to fast? 4x4 are not very good at it

 

[normspanners]

Looks like the drivers side wheel is towing in Gordon.

one wheel cannot toe in on its own
Gordon is the steering wheel centre when driving ?

 

[normspanners]

As your suspension is top and bottom wishbone which will have adjustable caster/ camber on the inner pivots by slackening the nut and turning the inner bolts, my money is on that being the problem, my mate has an amarok and I think that wore one of the fronts more than the other, in fact I have the tyres here I will have a look. Just checked one is slightly more worn but even across its area.
I would guess it is the camber so check it yourself before going for tyres as I have explained, because with camber/ tracking adj. one affects the other. and if the camber is out you will have to have the tracking done again

 

[gordon stephenson]

Hi Norm, Yes Steering wheel perfectly central, As far as I know never had any steering replacement parts fitted, Car has now done 29,000mls. Tread looks fairly even right across all except the 40mm or so on the inner edge.I would have expected the tread to taper from the worn out bit to the outside which is still well legal. Do these new fancy alignment rigs show up all steering geometry settings? (As long as the operator knows what he's doing)

 

[Wedg1e]

My TVR wrote off a front tyre in a few hundred miles due to a collapsed lower wishbone bush - the inboard end (it's actually a Cortina bottom arm). Tyre lost two inches off the inside edge all the way around whilst the rest of the tyre was sound - as the TVR's so low you couldn't see the inside of the tyre. I only found it by chance when I dropped my keys and had to grovel under the car for them!
It's a good old Metalastik bush, the inner tube had split along its length in three places, I never worked out why - unless a previous owner had kerbed it.

 

[Shox Dr]

You'd be (un)surprised at the amount of vehicles that have damage pre reg

 

[normspanners]

Hi Norm, Yes Steering wheel perfectly central, As far as I know never had any steering replacement parts fitted, Car has now done 29,000mls. Tread looks fairly even right across all except the 40mm or so on the inner edge.I would have expected the tread to taper from the worn out bit to the outside which is still well legal. Do these new fancy alignment rigs show up all steering geometry settings? (As long as the operator knows what he's doing)

If your steering is central it is NOT likely that the tracking is out, Laser systems dont have caster camber normally,it is an add on, that are not that accurate, the computerised one do they have senders on each wheel that transmit to receivers on the wall (look like satalite dishes)of the garage usually up high somewhere, they are good as long they have been cal ok etc they draw a virtual rectangle around the car, and give the angle placement of each wheel withinthe rectangle they also give caster camber kpi and whether the wheels are forward of each other but still aligned.
Having said that I have seen competition cars set up on both those systems that have been well out. I still like the old way of setting up the car on a flat bed with fish lines set up either side and measure to the wheels, and with a real caster camber gauge.
Competition cars are VERY susceptible to adjustment having rose joints in place of rubber bushes which can never be truly accurate, at any one suspension load/ position the actual settings are so large on a production car it is a joke so your car could still be within tol but actually be miles out, if they point somewhere near straight ahead, that near enough !! A car with rubbers should be rolled back and fro or be on slip plates, after each adjustment because the rubbers compress so when the suspension relaxes, it is now out again.
There is so much to know about sus geom that a tyre fitter or the apprentice doesnt know (in general) otherwise he wouldnt be a tyre fitter!!

 

[Wedg1e]

One of my clients used to be the Orange Arrows F1 race team; their car preparation bays at Leafield in Oxon. had slabs of granite set into the floor as reference planes for setting up the suspension.

As regards rubber suspension bushes, it always makes me laugh when people get all excited about their super new poyurethane bushes, how it's 'transformed' the handling... of course they overlook the fact that simply replacing the old tired rubber with new bushes of the original spec. would probably have the same effect and cost a fraction of the polyurethane...

 

[gordon stephenson]

O.K. Guys, just had four new tyres fitted and "Laser Alignment" done, Camber was a touch out on the worn tyre side, I bent down to read some of the onfo on the new tyre sidewall, All five bolts were in loose when I leaned on the tyre for support, Tyre fitter said "don't touch the wheel until the bolts are tight or you might snap them" Soon put him straight,

 

[normspanners]

Hi did they do sus geom with the wheels loose ? because you cant, the wheels should be obviously tight tight and the tyre pressures all equal
But if the camber was out then they would have had to set the tracking again.