Camber tire wear questions.... - Suspension and Brake Forum

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Camber tire wear questions....
Wednesday, March 02, 2011 7:20 PM
ok guys in the interest of keeping jay's thread clean i wanted to just start my own thread on the subject.

ive always thought that excessive camber caused the inner or outter edges of ur tires to wear prematurely...

to me... these images portray a camber issue. is that incorrect...??








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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Wednesday, March 02, 2011 7:21 PM
I guess I'll copy my post over, haha

How fast did it wear down to the cords?

Camber caused only one side to wear, caster is what caused it to wear quickly.

I have a few friends that have 2.5-3 deg of camber on their rear wheels, but they can go a whole season before you see that the inside of the wheel is wearing faster. But the difference definitely isn't that obvious.

The added wear on the inside of the tire comes from more pressure being on a smaller patch of rubber, so wheel spin and cornering have more of an effect on a smaller area. You also have to take into account that when you turn right, the right two wheels roll further onto the edge of the tire, while the left two wheels roll further onto the flat of the tire. Add under steer to the equation and you are scuffing a pretty small area of tire across course pavement on the inside tires. This creates a noticeable difference in wear, but like I said, not nearly as bad as those pictures.



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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Wednesday, March 02, 2011 7:25 PM
well for my beretta example it took a summer iirc... the outter edge had the cords showing while the rest of the tire was just fine. daily driving, no racing, no extreme situations etc...

ive just always heard and assumed since everybody else said it was that camber caused these issues... but skilz seems to think differently so thats what i mean.



If it takes forever.... I will die trying. Underdog Racing
Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Wednesday, March 02, 2011 9:28 PM
check your toe. that causes that kind of wear all the time.



Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Thursday, March 03, 2011 2:55 AM
The problem is both toe and camber. Your tires are already worn down pretty thin. Even a slight negative camber will cause cords to show pretty quickly. Also, your tires are chopped on the inside as well. There are places towards the inside where you have tread, and places where you don't. This is caused by toe being out of spec as well. The tire is essentially being dragged sideways down the road. This causes a very slight "skipping " of the tire, and leads to the chopping of the tire. Worn out struts can cause chopping as well. Since this is a FWD car and on the rear axle, caster isn't a factor. In fact, caster can't even be measured or adjusted on that car on the rear.




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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Thursday, March 03, 2011 3:45 AM
Damnit, I meant toe and was typing caster... I must have been really tired last night.



Paying someone to install parts and bragging about it being fast, is like watching someone bang your wife and being proud to raise their kids.
Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Thursday, March 03, 2011 5:37 AM
lol just to clarify, the pictures are of some bimmer i found. this is not my car. they were just for reference.



If it takes forever.... I will die trying. Underdog Racing
Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Thursday, March 03, 2011 3:37 PM
those pictures depict MAD toe and possibly mechanical failure. Perhaps bad ball joints/tie rods/control arm bushings.



Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Sunday, March 06, 2011 3:09 PM
Toe will wear a tire much more than camber will. Toe in or out is actually making the tire drag sideways. There's an actual ratio for each degree as to how much it would be if you wear dragging the tire sideways. Something like 1 foot for every 350 feet for every degree.
.



Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Sunday, March 06, 2011 5:29 PM
ok, just to put this to bed...

true or false... camber ALONE ALONE ALONE will cause the above pictured tire to wear like that. (not the cupping part, the extreme wear on the inside edge)



If it takes forever.... I will die trying. Underdog Racing
Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Tuesday, March 08, 2011 7:43 PM
Toe. You'll see rear tires on new body style GTO's caddy CTS V's, and G8's like that because of how much the toe change son those cars when they do burnouts. Thats 100% a toe issue. You dont get wear like that on the inside of the tire due to camber unless you're running retarded amounts of camber (I mean more retarded than a VW owners amount of camber, like over 10*'s).


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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Tuesday, March 08, 2011 10:13 PM
Thats's deffinatly Toe, on the bimmer pick you see how the wear comes to a feathered edge its a tell tale sign of toe being out.
Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Wednesday, March 09, 2011 8:47 PM
why is it most people assume this is a camber issue then?

to me its the laws of physics... the top of the tire is angled inward for fender wheel clearance making the bottom of the tire on the opposite side have more pressure on it thus making it an un-even pressure. causing it to wear improperly.

i mean dont get me wrong, im here to learn i just dont see how having a toe issue would not cause the entire surface of the tire to wear weird, not just the inside edge.



If it takes forever.... I will die trying. Underdog Racing
Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Wednesday, March 09, 2011 8:53 PM
z yaaaa wrote:why is it most people assume this is a camber issue then?

to me its the laws of physics... the top of the tire is angled inward for fender wheel clearance making the bottom of the tire on the opposite side have more pressure on it thus making it an un-even pressure. causing it to wear improperly.

i mean dont get me wrong, im here to learn i just dont see how having a toe issue would not cause the entire surface of the tire to wear weird, not just the inside edge.


But tires arent made of cement. They flex and more pressure on the tire doesnt make it wear faster. If that was the case big rigs would go through tires like you mama goes through a buffet line. Tires wear the quickest from slip. Thats why you can blow through tires doing burn outs and driving hard. But if your car never turned, never did burnouts and had zero toe your tires would last practically forever if you kept the tire temps down. Then you have toe the tire is always in slip when going straight.


1994 Saturn SL2 Home Coming Edition: backup car
2002 Chevy Cavalier LS Sport Coupe: In a Junk Yard
1995 Mazda Miata R-package Class=STR
Sponsored by: Kronos Performance

WPI Class of '12 Mechanical Engineering
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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Wednesday, March 09, 2011 9:05 PM
keep in mind also the tire will squat a bit as well. So 4 or 5 degrees will not have much effect on wear.



Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Thursday, March 10, 2011 2:30 PM
i know when i first had air ride my camber was off and i wore thru my tires in a season. im sure i had more then a few degrees of camber. more pressure on one side versus the other i would imagine would make anything wear out faster wether its spinning the wheels or just driving.

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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Thursday, March 10, 2011 5:23 PM
^^^ agreed.

and leafy.. big rigs DO go through tires at an insane rate. they blow out on the interstate constantly. lol



If it takes forever.... I will die trying. Underdog Racing
Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Thursday, March 10, 2011 5:26 PM
z yaaaa wrote:^^^ agreed.

and leafy.. big rigs DO go through tires at an insane rate. they blow out on the interstate constantly. lol


Yes but if pressure had as big of an impact as it would need to for camber wear then big rigs would need to make a pit stop half way on a run to get new treads.


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2002 Chevy Cavalier LS Sport Coupe: In a Junk Yard
1995 Mazda Miata R-package Class=STR
Sponsored by: Kronos Performance

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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Friday, March 11, 2011 1:07 PM
but if your taking the pressure and spreading it out evenly that is quite a bit diffrent then say 75% of the pressure being on a 2" section of tread versus a 10" wide section right?

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Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Friday, March 11, 2011 1:58 PM
Its a toe problem. What most people forget (with ride height adjustable suspensions) is that as you change ride height all the alignment settings change. Camber and toe make a huge change. I ran Azenis at about -2* for several years and had no abnormal wear issues. During that time my toe was kept to about +/- .25*. You will see identical wear on a tire that has no camber and caster that is within spec, but toe that is out a couple degrees.



Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Friday, March 11, 2011 2:50 PM
z yaaaa wrote:ok, just to put this to bed...

true or false... camber ALONE ALONE ALONE will cause the above pictured tire to wear like that. (not the cupping part, the extreme wear on the inside edge)


Sure. It MIGHT, after 200,000 miles. Or if you were burning rubber off every stop sign. The pictures you put up are from a toe problem, not camber, and would not happen from normal driving with zero toe.

As far as tractor trailer tires "blowing out", that's not whats happening. What happens is the recap (a new tread applied to the existing belts) separates from the sidewall. 99% of the time, this has nothing to do with tire pressure or alignment, but rather crappy assembly.
.




Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Friday, March 11, 2011 3:27 PM
z yaaaaa wrote:why is it most people assume this is a camber issue then?


cuz most ppls is stupid.

excessive toe will wear out a tire very VERY fast.

ask me how I know.





Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Friday, March 11, 2011 4:13 PM
haha my verts tires look like that and I definitely have a toe problem. I also have new tires to have put on when I get my front end alignment.



Re: Camber tire wear questions....
Saturday, March 12, 2011 11:48 AM
well all righty then.... toe it is.

thanks boys.



If it takes forever.... I will die trying. Underdog Racing
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