hey guys so i know its time for a wheel alignment but my tire wear is kind of weird. i've lowered my car with the h&r springs and i've noticed that the front tires have worn down way faster than the rears. i was just wondering what camber numbers i should be running cause i know something has to be wrong. i also read that you can't adjust the camber w.o the camber plates. am i right? btw i am runnin stock 16" wheels with run flats. thanks for your help.

 

Well how many miles do you have on the car and have you ever rotated the tires. If you have 20K and never rotated the tires you will have very worn front tires and only partially worn rear tires. And performance run flats seem to wear out much faster than many other tires.

 

Can you describe the front tire wear a little more?

Is it:
1. Scalloped
2. Wearing more in the middle
3. Wearing more on the edges
4. Wearing more on one side (inside) than the outside edge
5. Wearing evenly

Is it the same for the rear?

This will help determine whether there is a need for alignment i.e camber and toe adjustment.

In a FWD car, there is a tendency to wear the front tires more than the rear. That is not unusual.

 

Lowering the car does not affect the front tires much because the front camber does not change much with lowering. Your front toe might change a little which can cause the tire to scrap across the ground and wear a little faster (but not much).

It is your rear tires that should wear more due to lowering. The rear gains negative camber when lowered which causes the inside edge to wear faster.

As Slinger668 suggested, please provide us a little more info. Did you ever get the car aligned after lowering? How many total miles on the tires? How many miles on the tires after lowering.

I believe your year car is slightly adjustable for camber in the front. The front toe is adjustable. The rear has slightly adjustable camber so you can reduce the amount of negative camber to reduce tire wear. The rear toe is also adjustable.

 

If you remove the plastic locating pin from the front strut hat you can adjust the front camber a little bit.

 

i've been running my car lowered for about 10k and i pretty much lowered it as soon as i got it. the front tires have wear on the outer half of the tires almost down to the warning bumps and the rears have normal wear. i'm going on an epic road trip from socal to washington and i wanted to make sure that i would check everything on my car before i left.

 

If the outer half of the front tires are wearing I suspect you have positive camber, your toe is way off, or a combination of both. More likely just your toe needs adjustment.

Sounds like you are due some new tires and a good alignment.

I would have them align the front for as much negative front camber as possible with the stock adjustment (probably around -0.7 degrees) and set the toe near zero. The spec is for toe-in. I actually prefer a little toe out.

For the rear, align for less negative camber (try around -1.0 to -1.5 degrees) with the stock adjustment (unless you have aftermarket adjustable lower control arms) and set the toe near zero.

You can search NAM for all kinds of alignment setting suggestions.

 

Old thread... but, was getting a pulsating humming in my right front at 55+ mph... thought it was a wheel bearing... brought it to the dealership and took a ride w/ a tech, he told me it sounded more like my tires... he checked them and they were scalloped. The way he described it was the inner and outer edge tread blocks of the tire were individually sloped...

i looked for a diagram and this is what he was describing physically...


but this is described as 'feathering':
Feathering
Feathering is a condition when the edge of each tread rib develops a slightly rounded edge on one side and a sharp edge on the other. By running your hand over the tire, you can usually feel the sharper edges before you'll be able to see them. The most common cause of feathering is incorrect toe-in setting, which can be cured by having It set correctly. Occasionally toe-in will be set correctly and this wear pattern still occurs. This is usually due to deteriorated bushings in the front suspension, causing the wheel alignment to shift as the car moves down the road.


but his explanation was scalloping:
Cupping
Cups or scalloped dips appearing around the edge of the tread on one side or the other, almost always indicate worn (sometimes bent) suspension parts. Adjustment of wheel alignment alone will seldom cure the problem. Any worn component that connects the wheel to the car (ball joint, wheel bearing, shock absorber, springs, bushings, etc.) can cause this condition. Worn components should be replaced with new ones. The worn tire should be balanced and possibly moved to a different location on the car. Occasionally, wheels that are out of balance will wear like this, but wheel imbalance usually shows up as bald spots between the outside edges and center of the tread.

Either way, its the pic of the feathering that is occuring on my tread blocks, on the inner and outer tread of the tire.
Run your hand over it in both directions, with your fingers pointing axially across the tire, thus your fingers pointing into the center of the car, flat, and running it over the surface of the tire tread in either direction, it should remain relatively smooth.

...which looks like so


from feeling the tires, i can feel an incline on each tread block and drop off to the next tread block when running my fingers over it, its choppy and not smooth roundness...
He said it was most likely due to me being lowered. It was noticiable on both front tires, worse on passenger, and rears were okay.
I got an alignment twice after lowering, the 2nd time with adjustable rear control arms- talking to the tech that did the alignment- we looked at the computer output and the front right camber was off, and he didn't want to adjust the top three bolts of the strut, even though I told him it was adjustable. He got toe back, and everything else was in spec minus the front right camber.

The tires have about 3k miles on them or a little more, so I haven't rotated them yet.

What usually causes scalloped tires? Any suggestions for alignment specifics for this? And, since they are inside/outside tires, if I swap the fronts around, technically the tires will be spinning the opposite direction... would this even out the scalloping or just make its effects worse on the highway?

Hope someone picks the thread up... thanks!


*edit, sorry, i should add that I've been complaining of a 'wallowing' problem in the car when travelling over 60mph, where the car rolls more than necessary, aka, turning wheel left rolls right, turning wheel right rolls left, and when turning wheel back straight the car should straighten out, but instead, the car rolls right again before settling back to straight. Passing on the highway (pulling out to left lane, while accelerating, then pulling back into right lane) will make the car feel like its a swaying boat. My guess has been its (a) blown strut(s), since I'm lowered 1.25" on mach v springs with stock sport struts. I'm looking at koni adjustables/bilsteins in the near future. To add to my above statements, "scalloping" is described with broken suspension components (aka my struts in this case), but again, what he described with rubbing fingers over and showing the inclined tread blocks is still feathering... which is deduced from an incorrect toe setting.

 

Front tires will wear faster regardless considering this is fwd car. Additionally, I think tire rotations are in order

 

I understand the fronts will wear fast in a FWD, that is expected.
However, the tire itself should wear evenly, and not cause a scalloping effect, or feathering effect. It should not create inclines on outer tread blocks which cause slow pulsating humming on the highway. This, is either a suspension component problem or an alignment offset.

*edit.. oops looks like you may have been replying to OP... sorry, note that OP posted in 09, just over a year ago... I just added to the last post of this thread with my own concern on my car.

 

woops! my bad too... didnt know it w as from 09.