Question-------------------------
Followup To
Question -
I purchased a new 1999 Toyota Camry LE 6 cylinder new in September of 2000. Since the day I drove the car off the lot I complained to the dealer that something was wrong with the car, front end alignment, suspension, etc. They aligned the car and said it was fine. It still was not. The original tires on the car were Dunlop. They were replaced at approx. 17,500 miles and replaced with Michelin Symetry tires warrented for 60,000 mi. tread life. Still having the front end problem, although the dealer's service department said there is nothing wrong. By 43,790 miles (26,000 miles later), my car had chewed up the Symetry tires (bald, bald)and they replaced them with Michelin Pilots with a 45,000 mile tread warranty. Now, 23,790 miles later, these tires need to be replaced (in about half of the warranted tread wear life). I still think there's something wrong with this car. I have never had to purchase tires before the tread life warranty has expired on ANY car. I don't drag race, peel the tire, drive off-road. Please help me. What could cause this? What specifically should I tell the service department to investigate, if anything? Thank you so much.
Answer -
Tina,
You've said that you believe there is a problem with the car since day one, but I didn't see that you identified what it was that makes you say that - other than the the tire wear, but that occurred later! I also note that the vehicle is now 7 years old and has about 70,000 miles, which works out to about 10,000 miles per year. I should also point out that the vehicle (V6 Camry) is known for chewing up front tires.
So, a couple questions:
1) Is it only the front tires that are worn out? If so, then this is pretty much as expected. The worst set of tires you had went 17,500 on the front, and since the fronts wear at 2 1/2 times the rate of the rears, the rear tires would have gone 44,000 miles - overall not too bad.
2) Did you rotate the tires? (Kind of links up with question #1)
3) Do the tires show an unusual wear pattern.
4) And back to the begining - what makes you think there was a problem with the car to begin with?
FOLLOWUP:
The reason I thought something was wrong with the car from day one was because I could feel vibration in the seat, some in the steering wheel (even after tire replacement). My tires have been rotated every 5,000 to 5,500 miles. A detailed history: Two weeks after delivery at 1,189 miles they did a front end alignment, two weeks later I brought it in because it pulled to the left and they swapped the front tires, four months later at 5,469 miles I brought it back in for pulling left and vibration (starting at 40 mps and worse from there). They stated the tires were wearing due to alignment and relaced four tires (keep in mind the alignment was just done 3-1/2 months earlier and I hadn't hit anything). 7 months later (11,990 miles) when I brought my car in for regular service I told them it still had road vibration and steering wheel shakes and vehicle pulls sharply to the left, so they balanced tires (rotated them also as regular service)and performed a four wheel alignment. One year later at 17,812 miles, they replaced all four tires. Still had the same problems, insisted something was wrong (never, ever had to have a car aligned this many times in this short of a time). So I quit complaining. At 43,286 had a four wheel alignment. At 43,410 I brought it in for something else and they told me I needed four new tires (yes, they were bald - but they couldn't tell me that when they did the alignment 800 miles ago?).
All the tires were worn about the same each of times. This time the one that is currently on the left rear is totally bald (accross both the inside and outside edge) and the other three are worn but not smooth. Tires were rotated 5,000 miles ago and there was no mention that the tires were wearing. So in short, all four are wearing, so the front tires wearing at 2-1/2 times faster doesn't apply and the most I have gotten out of all of the tires is 17,500 miles.
Please help. Thank you.
AnswerOK, much more detail and something I can work on!
First change where you go to get all this done. Find yourself a good alignment shop and get a 4 wheel alignment. Hopefully they will already know this but whatever the vehicle manufacturer's tolerance are, divide them by 2. Not the specs themselves, just the allowable range!
I think the problem is in the camber, maybe the left front. These aren't adjustable unless you make them adjustable - which is probably why they didn't fix the problem.
Just as a point of reference, an alignment problem may cause the tires to wear irregularly and that might lead to a vibration (or noise), but new tires would solve a vibration caused by irregular wear. So your inital diagnosis was faulty - the vibration was not caused by misalignment. There was a misalignment and there was a vibration, but they weren't connected.
If I were you I would get a little more actively involved in solving the problem. Get the print out of the alignment. Look at the specs (remember that 50% tolerance change I said above) See where the alignment is out of this tolerance.
Also check your inflation pressure and your tread depth periodically and record them. That way you'll know how the tires are wearing and can see if they are wearing unevenly long before they actually wearout.
Hope this helps.
