Tires rapidly losing tread

The original place should of given you a print out of before/after alignment specs.

Tire wear.... Pilot Exalto isn't exactly a long wearing tire. After this set, you may want to get a set that has a higher wear rating

20IndigoBlue02 said:

Pilot Exalto isn't exactly a long wearing tire. After this set, you may want to get a set that has a higher wear rating

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At this rate, I'll be in the market for new ones by sometime in June.

Get that car properly aligned pronto

The tires will continue to wear excessively until aligned properly.

Had a similar issue years ago. The tire shop aligned my car, using a computer system, but the tire jocky had no clue what he was doing. The new tires wore excessively. When I finally brought the car to a reputable front end shop, they used the old fashioned stick with pointers and showed the toe in was off by 3/4 inch!!!

While it is possible to use a tape to set some alignment parameters like toe in, say during an emergency side of the road adjustment (been there)there is no excuse in today's age to do so. Good or bad equipment, the operator makes a huge difference.

An alignment shop should be able to tell you what the existing alignment is before they correct it.

I have had a couple of bad alignments on 2 different cars. They seemed to drive fine but the excessive tire wear was the dead give-away that there was a problem. Unfortunately by the time tire wear is normally noticed new tires are required.

A number of years ago I found a good alignment shop. They would even do custom alignments that I specified for running the Miata on the track. Even though I have moved I still go back to the same place because the alignment tech is the same guy and he does an excellent job.

A good alignment tech will check for wheel bearing, tie-rod, ball joint, and other suspension wear before starting an alignment. If any suspension component is worn it will cause the alignment to move about due to the slop in the worn components. A lazy or ignorent tech won't bother to check first and you will get an improper alignment.

Once you find a good shop/tech keep going back there. A cheap alignment that chews up $500 worth of tires is no bargain.

I use Schlott Tire in Tewksbury MA. They have a web page if your interested.

Jeffmx5 said:

Once you find a good shop/tech keep going back there. A cheap alignment that chews up $500 worth of tires is no bargain.

I use Schlott Tire in Tewksbury MA. They have a web page if your interested.

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Thanks for the clear explanation of how a sloppy tech can overlook important stuff.

I'm certainly in the market for a good alignment shop, but Massachusetts is probably out of my range for that kind of work (although Maine might not be too far for a timing belt). I've had some PM exchanges with another New Jersey TDI Club member, Hevster1, who uses OK car and truck in Stewartsville, N.J., not too far east of Easton, Pa., on I-78. Maybe I'll stop there next.

Thanks again.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but once a tire begins to wear unevenly because of a bad alighnment or whatever, it usually continues to wear in the same pattern as it had before the fix. An alighnment might extend your mileage a bit, but the damage has been done. I'd watch the Tirerack ads closely for a sale in the near future. For what it's worth, I had good wear with Nokian tires on my Jetta, though they are biased more toward winter driving and they are expensive. Good luck!