Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Wheels & Tires A tire wear question...

I was out doing some maintenance today including front to back tire rotation. I noticed a strange wear pattern on the front, especially the driver's side. These tires are new this year, and were balanced on installation, I have rotated them one other time.

What's going on here? Can I fix it? If so how?

Driver's side (inside of tire to left):



Passenger's side (inside to right):



Same pattern, but no where near as bad.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance and

HAPPY HOLIDAYS ! ! !

youre supposed to brake before cornering...jk

Is the camber ok / looks like that might be a cause or even the toe adjustment on that tire. that is a pretty weird wear patterm as it is smoothly worn on just the corner of the tread...

It looks like the typical too much negative camber issue. Alignment readings would help in determining. If you have some recent alignment readings, can you post them? If it were a toe adjustment problem, usually both sides would wear evenly. You may also have worn lower control arm bushings allowing the caster to move.

Inspect your suspension parts for wear first and if OK get the camber kits and get them installed ASAP.

The front struts must be removed for the install. Any good alignment tech should be able to understand how to make the adjustments once they are installed.

Some guidelines on selecting camber settings. The more the negative camber, the better the car corners as the tire contact patch improves when loaded on turns. Too much negative camber causes inside edge wear (as you are experiencing). Even being in spec, but on the far side of spec, can cause inside edge wear. The best wear would be a 0 degrees caster. Most cars are fine with between 1/4 degree and 3/4 degree of negative camber (both sides nearly even). Many have no trouble with as much as 1 degree negative camber, but going beyond that can become questionable. My car came with 1.3 degrees negative camber and had inside edge tire wear on both tires until I installed the camber kits. I now have them at near 0 degrees (slightly negative) and feel that the handling did not suffer much.

With the camber kits, both camber and caster are adjusted together. You want to adjust it so that the caster is moved in the postiive direction while dialing in the camber. On our cars with this kit, it is not possible to get too much positive caster. Increased positive caster slightly increases steering effort, but it also improves steering wheel returnability to center after turning.

Some guidlines for the entire alignment settings. Start with the rear settings. The only adjustment for the rear is the toe. Caster is not applicable, and camber is not adjustable. Set the rear toe as close to 0 as possible while still being slightly towed in. Setting the rear toe also sets the thrust angle which should be as close to 0 as possible. Basically the thrust angle coordinates the rear to the front. Set the front camber according to the above guidlines (my suggestion is under 1/2 degree negative) While getting the caster as high as possible. Set the front toe as close to 0 as possible while still being slightly toed out (the opposite of the rear).

If you do all this right away you can still get some reasonable wear out of those tires. If you don't, well you know the answer.

I had the car at Sears Auto the other day. I hit a nasty pothole and had some vibrations since then. I noticed that some of the weights had come off, and I have lifetime balancing. I decided to have it aligned while I was there. They said the Driver's side ball joint was bad causing this weird wear. Does that sound right?

They replaced that, aligned it and rebalanced the passenger's side wheels. The tech said that he couldn't get all of the vibration out since the wheels were dented on that side a little on the inside. I know that the front one is dented, as I saw it. I will check them again today.

The whole intent of "lifetime" balance or alignment is to have an excuse to "find" something that needs repair. For the most part, shops that sell "lifetime" alignments have a strong tendency to abuse it. "Lifetime" balances aren't as risky.