Wheel alignment - yea or nay?
 

Ok, it's getting close to the time to order those Yoko' AVS Db's, since I've "screwed" around long enough & would like to make it to Lafayette on "real" tires for a change. Should I part with the extra 60 bucks to get an alignment? The car exhibits none of the pulling, or drifting off center stuff that would make the choice obvious. The tread on the 3 remaining Dunlops & their distant cousin, the Bridgestone, shows no uneven wear. In the interest of adhering to the "If it ain't broke, don't fix it", adage; should I subject the car to the unknown just to help pay off that 100K Hunter alignment machine? Or - should I just install the tires & see how they perform & wear for 30 days or so, & then do the deed if necessary?

I bow to the wealth of educated guesses & hearsay of the group.
TIA - Ron.

if your car is awd, it is in your best interest to get all around the same tire anyways, so getting them is not a bad idea. I guess you were going to do this by the looks of it, so no issue there.

regarding alignment, i personally do 1 every year. if money is an issue, then dont worry about it. since there is no uneven wear, you are probably okay, and regarding feeling it pull etc..this car is so heavy and as such keeps its track so well that a mild misalignmet might not be detected.

so if the tires look good, and the car is not misbehaving, then you are okay. the only advantage of an alignment is that while your camber and toe might be within spec, they might not be equal from left to right. doing an alignment would help that.

bassem

If the tires are wearing o.k. and the car's driving well, why bother? A sloppy alignment could change all of that... ;)

It is a good idea to check your rims and see if they are round;) Simple dial indicator will do the trick. This will let you know if the rims are bent before you go for the new tires.

I had a look at this as Ron had posted and as I read I thought Òwhy risk some clot messing things upÒ. Reading further what do we have but more sound advice from the expert with whom no one should disagree.

I hate relying on wheel alignments as I am always in doubt as to the ability of the operator as well as the continued accuracy of their machine which may or may not be looked after and checked, having had one very bad experience.

Ron I have the feeling that you were of the same opinion but would feel happier with confirmation. Sorry about the ÔÕÕÕÕÕ. ------ Trevor.

Its a tough call on alignment. The place I go to does an alignment, test drives it for about 15 miles and then re-checks it. I've never been disapointed in them, but there a few places that take the care they do (ask Lightning, he's been there).

Most (no flames necessary) shops invest in machenery instead of mastery training since they are excepting a high turnover of people due to low wages. But a machine is useless if you don't know how to properly adjust the alignment.

I would say run it for a few hundred miles and look for wear. If the cars handles well and isn't wearing unevenly, I'd say skip it.

Doug

I wish I worked at one of those shops, since we don't have alignment comebacks they figure we don't need a new machine. :rolleyes: It works o.k. but it's a dinosaur. However it must be fairly accurate as the Ford Louisville Truck Plant sends me a new truck once in a while for alignment verification. I can tell you that their machine is pretty fancy-shmancey compared to ours.

Anyway, that's what I was getting at above, you rarely know the condition of the machine or the proficiency of the operator. So, if they're wearing o.k., why risk the alignment?

Here's where the plot thickens though, what are your plans for wheel balancing? Most people get by with the run of the mill balance when their tires are first installed. Then there are those that are more sensitive, or their cars should ride smoother than the average beater. Sometimes the car has a strange situation where a vibration comes and goes at higher speeds. Yadda, yadda, yadda.

Hunter Engineering makes a balancer that applies a load (one thousand pounds) roller against the tire as it rotates and checks the tire and wheel for any out-of-roundness as well as density variations in the tread rubber and finally the balance. If it finds a deficiency other than balance it will advise the operator and tell him(her) how to correct the problem, usually by having the tire rotated on the rim to the prime position and re-checking before final balance. Heckuva machine. Yeah, the balance will cost more but it can find and correct those niggling balance problems that one sometimes has to put up with for the life of the tire(s).

To find out who has such a mchine in your area, go to http://www.hunter.com/pub/product/product.htm, click on the 'GSP 9700 Vibration Control System' then next to the first picture on the next page will be a locator for shops in your area.
Truth be known, that's where I'm heading as soon as I finish here this morning. I have a problem at high speed where the vibes come and go, generally caused by a tire or two having a tad of run-out and falling in and out of synch with each other. When they're in synch you feel the vibration, etc.

This was a just thought as you could have the tires mounted at the same shop intead of making two trips.

Beav

Beav, One of the shops I use has this machine and I had my wheels balanced there awhile ago. They found two bent rims on my car that I had replaced. A wasn't too happy with the balance I got though:( but I am thinking now it was because the tires were old and the belts were coming apart or something else. (Maybe such as my front dif is coming apart:eek:) Anyway I've had new AVS db tires for about 4 months now and I am thinking about get them balanced on the HUNTER machine.

The rear passenger tire has about .03 inch runout. Do you think I should get it replaced?

Also could you tell me more about how the tire is rotated on the rim to compensate for tire runout? Is this something a shop would normally do? I know a guy down south that actually mounts his tires and them gets the tread machined down to make the tire run round. However I haven't found anyone that does this around me. If I could get this done I could keep my bent rim:D

Thanks for all the educated guesses, (no offense, brothers). I never gave a tire mount, balance & alignment a second thought prior my owning one of these beasts, but perhaps, paranoia will pay off. The two shops I'm considering for the honor of doing business with me, both use the Hunter 9700 machine. Not that they know how to use it, but at least it's on premise. I'm still debating the alignment portion, unless the shop genius can point out something I'm missing without sounding like he just needs the practice.

Oh - just curious again. Has anyone ever tried to negotiate a road hazard warranty whereby the shop agrees to replace TWO tires if one is destroyed, say after 10K of wear? In the interest of keeping all things equal on the same axel, I don't think such a plan should be out of the question.

With appreciation to all of you,
Ron.

I have a question for a few of you, If you are driving down a street and come to a part of the road that dips as tho the pavement was driven on soft and now has 2 low spots, does the car fight you to steer itself? My tires run 44 psi and there is one part of route 44 that I don't even want to drive on anymore. Is it just the heavy car that steers itself, or should I lower my psi from the recommended 44 psi down to 35 or so?

look on the inside of your driver door (not the door itself) for the recommended tire pressures. They are 33psi and 29psi if I recall correctly (92 LS-L).

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

I neer thougt that there was a recomended tire pressure for the car. I always figured the tire itself was the thing that told you what it needed, but ifyour sure on this I will try it. Thanks

I know where you're coming from on the 'two tire' warranty claim. I'd shoot for four, but unless there's an exact, verbatim clause stating that they will do that, I'd say you're chances are nil, at best.

Shaving tires (other than for race cars) has all but disappeared. The last time I saw any equipment for shaving tires was in the late '70s, a machine called 'Auto-Match System'. It also used a load roller that determined run-out and then timed a panel that threw two rasps forward and shaved the edges of the tires at their high points. The reasoning was that any offset would be transmitted up the shoulder of the tire, that any offset in the middle of the tire would be absorbed by tread flex. I think it worked o.k., but the machines were never sold, only leased and when the company went belly-up the machines were yanked back by the creditors, or so we were told. I've never seen one of them since, kinda makes you wonder where they all went...

.030" seems kind of trivial, I've seen many tires mounted that exceed that much many times over without causing problem. Stranger things have happened though...

The machine will give the operator a set of marks to go by, one for the wheel and one for the tire. Then the tire is deflated and the beads broken (on a tire machine.) The tire is then rotated on the wheel until the marks line up and re-inflated. Put the tire/wheel combo back on the machine and start over.

Align it
 

Ron.

My local tyre place does mine on a 4 wheel laser thingy for about 50 bucks. I have taken the trouble to re-align after hitting potholes and bursting tyres. It is always out after a thump.

Way I figure it, the job only needs to save you 10% of tyre wear or less to be worth it. You know how quick they can wear uneven.

Also,the car drives better after, but I find it not easy to have all 4 wheels straight, AND the steering wheel straight.

The SVX does not show heavy pulling in my experience. I had two fast Renaults, fwd, and if the rear wheels were down a few pounds, the steering pulled. You could drive the SVX with one nearly flat and not notice the steering pulling. So you might have drag on your tyres, be wearing them badly through mis-alignment, and not see much difference to drive.

Play it by the book is my rule.

Joe:)

Yeah, I noticed that, I checked my tire pressure just for the heck o it about 2 weeks ago and they were all over the place, 12.5 in the rear right, 38 in the left rear, 35 in the front right and 22 in te front left. WOW I couldn't even tell until I filled them all back up to 40 and the car cornered 5 times better. It's been holding since so I don't knowhow long they have been there for. No difference in wheel pull tho. Interesting...I thought so:rolleyes: