Hello all,

I got my car back from getting its exhaust done and was made aware that the inner block of both tyres are worn badly.

I took it to my local alignment place that did the alignment previously, they put it on their hunter machine and said its fine. 

I've attached a photo of their printout of the alignment, I'll get a photo of the wear on the tyres in a bit. I had to swap the fronts to the rears and vice versa as the rears have

good tread, even though they are old.

I have replaced the Drop links, track rod ends, wishbone bushes and ball joints over the last few months so unless those parts are defective (Checked them when swapping wheels, they seem 100%) I dont know what is causing it.

I checked the old tyres off the front and they seem to have the same wear on them.

 

They've adjusted the right front toe, so it should be ok now.

 

What's the question again?

35 minutes ago, sepulchrave said:

They've adjusted the right front toe, so it should be ok now.

 

What's the question again?

What was causing the insides of both front tyres to wear so quickly?

The tracking was out, they adjusted it, it should be fixed now.

Just now, sepulchrave said:

The tracking was out, they adjusted it, it should be fixed now.

Heres hoping, thanks.

To me this sounds more like, the overall alignment is out a bit, you took it back to a place which sounds a lot like KwikFit, who tend to now have proper alignment benches, they checked its toing, which is still okay, but the machine spews out all the other alignment settings.

 

I did that to my older daughter's previous 2009 Ibiza SC, it was only the toing I was getting reset as I had replaced the TREs and track rods - and I did not know that they had a Hunter bench, I did go away slightly concerned by the well out of spec castor readings, but I reckoned that the steering wheel had not been moved about as the machine's menu would have demanded, so the castor result would be meaningless.

 

In reality, a bit silly it seems to me having an alignment bench and using it only for toe setting/checking at a tyre place, which then results with the customer being handed a full alignment results sheet with most settings/measurements in red ie out of spec - and being told "everything is good" at the least I would have expected that place to comment on all these other measurements and give advice as to what to do next, even although they were being asked to carry out a simple toe check, some/most times customers do not know what else might be wrong or needing resolved.

 

I got the impression that the KwikFit I went to - it was local, would not get involved with trying to sort out anything except toe errors, a bit of a waste of a Hunter bench, maybe operator training will happen later on and some correction of alignment where possible will get offered, though with these cars, short of moving the lower crossmember around there is not much else that can be done expect for replacing damaged parts.

They arent a Kwikfit nor are they a large chain store like Kwikfit but they just happen to be the only place in my town that do alignments. Brand new hunter machine.

I got told something along the lines of "oh, maybe its a worn balljoint" but all that stuff was replaced less than a month ago. The only thing I haven't replaced is the Front anti roll bar d bushes, inner track rods (they felt fine when doing the outers)  and the shocks/top mounts themselves suspension wise

On 28/05/2021 at 20:05, DieselMonte said:

I've attached a photo of their printout of the alignment

And that says to me that they've put the camber worse out than it was when they started. How much did they pay you for training their operators?

 

NB camber and/or tracking can cause edge wear anyplace.

 

Pushing an FWD chassis hard through roundabouts sometimes causes OSF outer edge wear, so that would be a red herring here I think.

Edited 30 May, 20215 yr by KenONeill

I'll not lie, I have my suspicions about what they did or didnt do to the car (hence why I asked here). When I looked at the alignment sheet The after made me think they had put someone in the drivers seat to see if there was any change in alignment. The before shows 1 degree of camber and the after is almost none on the pass side and 1.5 on the drivers. Same goes for the rear. (I'm probably wrong, but I'm stuck for any *other* reason as to why camber could be so different for the entire drivers side.)

They did not charge me this time.

Plenty of roundabouts near me, never found myself pushing the car hard around them.

5 minutes ago, DieselMonte said:

They did not charge me this time.

Thank goodness for that!

 

The comment about roundabouts was because pushing round them is the usual cause of edge wear with correct geometry.

I didn't think camber was adjustable, certainly the tracking has been adjusted and everywhere is getting Hunter machines because there are plenty of cars with more adjustable suspension and they can charge extra which covers the additional cost of the monthly lease.

1 hour ago, sepulchrave said:

I didn't think camber was adjustable, certainly the tracking has been adjusted and everywhere is getting Hunter machines because there are plenty of cars with more adjustable suspension and they can charge extra which covers the additional cost of the monthly lease.

Camber is not adjustable, so I dont know myself why its reading so different in the before and after. Hopefully its not going to wear out tyres like it did. Thanks.

1 hour ago, KenONeill said:

Thank goodness for that!

 

The comment about roundabouts was because pushing round them is the usual cause of edge wear with correct geometry.

Will keep that in mind next time I see a roundabout, I certainly am not going fast around them, but good to be aware, thanks.

...Bent shock could also cause the tracking/steering to be out a bit.

8 hours ago, mrgf said:

...Bent shock could also cause the tracking/steering to be out a bit.

With the state of our roads this isn't impossible.

The tyres I've put on the front are already showing the same wear after 500 miles of driving.

Yes, they are very dry and do absolutely need replacing. Very glad I just swapped fronts to back and didnt buy a brand new pair of tyres and have them wear like this.

Definately going to go elsewhere and get the alignment checked.

Lord knows whats causing this wear. If its even on both sides then surely its something alignment related.

Errr, it really doesn't look that bad from here, I can see all the wear blocks are at a similar depth on both tyres and they're close to worn out all the way across.

What tyre pressure do you run?

 

Thanks, AG Falco

29 minutes ago, sepulchrave said:

Errr, it really doesn't look that bad from here, I can see all the wear blocks are at a similar depth on both tyres and they're close to worn out all the way across.

I've put some more close up photos. They are worn and are getting replaced.

Tyre wear was perfectly even though before being put on the fronts.

27 minutes ago, AGFalco said:

What tyre pressure do you run?

 

Thanks, AG Falco

32psi all round.

10 hours ago, DieselMonte said:

I've put some more close up photos.

Yeah, those are goosed. That sort of edge sipe wear I'd associate with specific makes rather than with a geometry issue.

4 hours ago, KenONeill said:

Yeah, those are goosed. That sort of edge sipe wear I'd associate with specific makes rather than with a geometry issue.

I needed to replace them anyway, but odd that the same wear is present on both pairs I've had on the front.

20 hours ago, DieselMonte said:

32psi all round.

It looks like the inside edges are more worn than the rest of the tread on the front tyres.

Not unusual and you can find that the rear tyres wear the outside edge more.

 

What I do is fit new tyres to the rear and swap the old rear tyres diagonally to the front.

I also run mine at 2.4 bar, especially if you have a heavy diesel engine.

Fronts will last about 27K miles for me but with no adverse edge wear at the end.

 

Thanks, AG Falco

 

 

2 hours ago, AGFalco said:

It looks like the inside edges are more worn than the rest of the tread on the front tyres.

Not unusual and you can find that the rear tyres wear the outside edge more.

 

What I do is fit new tyres to the rear and swap the old rear tyres diagonally to the front.

I also run mine at 2.4 bar, especially if you have a heavy diesel engine.

Fronts will last about 27K miles for me but with no adverse edge wear at the end.

 

Thanks, AG Falco

 

 

27k miles? Is that all motorway driving? I only got 5k miles on the fronts of my car before I put them to the back last week. Granted all my driving is backroads and towns. I do get on main roads but not much.

What make of tyres are they ?

 

My Fabia seems to be feathering the inside of the rears, they need changing anyway and after a lot of internet searching seem its common to many VAG group cars and no real apparent fix, read it on Seat leons, golfs, octavias, A3's.....it seems it's just the way the rear suspension is set up.

Edited 8 June, 20214 yr by UrbanPanzer

2 pairs of tyres now with this wear

I got some Accelera Phi-R tyres around christmas, for the front.

The current pair on the front are some Toledo Tl1000 tyres that were on the rear of the car when I bought it. Dated late 2015. No abnormal wear on the toledos when they were on the rear. Now that they're on the front, inner edge wear.

Weirdly, the tyres that were on the front originally were showing the same wear but to a much lesser extent. I only replaced them as a pothole lunched the passenger front tyre. 

I think it could be as simple as a woeful alignment. I parked up to collect a takeaway and the steering wheel was slightly to the left. The drivers side front wheel was straight, and the passengers side was out to the left.