Reply With QuoteBMW? Run flat tires
Does anyone on here have any idea what could be causing uneven tyre wear this excessive?
Every week I run my hands over the tyres and feel for the wear blocks (I know it’s close on the middle and outside edge but they are still of legal depth) so you can imagine my horror when I had a puncture and discovered this on the inside edge.
I booked my car straight in with a Mercedes Benz specialist and despite putting it on the ramp and checking all the suspension, road testing it, and checking the alignment they can’t see what’s wrong.
I had similar wear with the last lot of rears (although nowhere near this bad) and again a laser alignment found no fault.
I’m totally baffled by this.
BMW? Run flat tires
Strange that it's on the inside edge. Stupid question...but there's nothing on the inside arch which is rubbing against the tyre?
What’s it like at the tyre on the opposite side?
Have you had a 4 wheel alignment check done? I am sure that would flag up the issue.
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Mercedes with regular tyresOriginally Posted by AndyMilts
Excessive wear on the inside edge of that one too. Not as bad as this one but the cord was just starting to show
When I discovered it last time the tyre house changing the tyres did a 4 wheel laser alignment but nothing flagged up. He said it was fine. I put it down to me possibly running with under inflated tyres that time so I made sure to keep an eye on the pressures this time, but it’s the same if not worse.
do you frequently drive down roads with speed bumps .... a well known cause
Had the problem on a BMW the set up set that wheel ran on inside edge, x5 it went through tires quickly
Try the Mercedes forums OP, I had a Mercedes w211 chassis a few years ago and that used to go though a lot of tyres.
My in-laws are all mechanics and I remember them telling me that the standard camber set up on Mercs can cause issues on UK road.
Went back to bmw’s And have had no issues with tyre wear.
Get someone else to do it and then get your money back from those people, can only be cancer or tow
I would get it checked again by another garage, it is either excessive camber or toe as you stated the tyre pressures were ok.
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Interestingly enough there are a number of them in the area I work. Never had this issue on other cars I ran though.
Any idea of a good MB forum. There seem to be loads of them.
In fairness to them, when they checked and it showed up ok, they didn’t charge me for it.
Toe in/out or camber incorrect.
Also, check the dampening on that corner. Could be the suspension letting it drop disproportionately (to the other wheels) under load, cornering etc, and making the edge of that tyre work harder.
That is very worrying.
It looks so severe, you would have thought the cause would be relatively easy to identify.
My first thought was tracking or camber, but if they have been checked then I am not sure where you can go from there really. Maybe check the same thing with another garage, as lots of garages do not know how to do a proper wheel alignment, particularly if it has air suspension or something similar. We had hellish troubles getting the wheels on our Discovery aligned as there were so few places that could ACTUALLY do it properly, despite loads saying that they could.
My old Audi used to wear the insides on the rear and I was told it was due to the springs being a bit too stiff when it was new and it would soften with time - which it did. Have you have any suspension work done lately?
That's not unheard of on a Merc saloon.
Normally inner edges on rear, outer on front.
It's just the way they're set up.
BMW's are the same.
Has it had any suspension mods (lowering springs etc?) Is there an anti roll bar fitted and is it and the bushes in good condition? Is there any play in the rubbers on the ball joints? Which model is it?
This may be helpful:-
https://mbworld.org/forums/c63-c63s-...side-edge.html
Last edited by tixntox; 6th September 2019 at 14:39.
Camber, is it s C63? Alingnment may show correct,green in every box but this is to manufacturers specs, if it left the factory set like this then alignment will measure it to this spec.Are both tyres like this? or just nearside?
Looks as though straddling speed cushions could be the cause - or do you drive one wheel over the cushion and one on the road?
Some info here https://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring...to-shreds.html
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Camber.
"They all do that, sir."
Remember that the hunter jigs etc are for the operator not the customer, provided you have the dimensions, stringing the car is still the best way.
I had a repair done to a runflat on my BMW as the tread was over 4mm in the centre of the tyre so thought to run it a bit longer. The tyre repairer chap showed me the wear to the inner edge of the tyre where there was no tread left !! He said it was common to certain BMWs and Mercedes , and there was me thinking that having 4mm left after 23,000 miles was rather good...
It's worse with the rft BMW's as there is so little flex in the sidewall so the tyre runs on its edge a lot more.
Had it on my X5, a 4 wheel alignment with the camber set to be within spec but at its most upright position in spec sorted it out (along with 2 new tyres!)
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Mine is an estate. Not sure if that would make it better or worse
No suspension modifications. The car is completely standard.
It’s a regular E220
Too much toe in wears the outside edges, too much toe out wears the inside edges. Camber can also be the culprit.
For more ideas causes......
https://www.knowyourparts.com/techni...ing-tire-wear/
Started out with nothing. Still have most of it left.
Do you carry load as a matter of course?
i have suffered with this inner edge wear, did a set in 7k miles, i just kept swapping tyres till i found a more resistant brand, nexen were the best made 28k miles on a set.
Never had it on my 5 series despite the rears leaning in visibly on the rear, they did over 60k on the factory tyre
most of the time its how they make them.
Judging by the angle the tyre has been cut away at, to me that's negative camber causing the issue and not tracking
Yep, big suspension geometry issue - not wheel alignment per se.
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks long into you.........
I work in vehicle dynamics and spend a fair chunk of my life developing suspension geometry, and along with it geometry settings.
Every cars settings are are compromised/optimised for a given target customer, predicted mix of road types and loading conditions.
Estate cars are often relatively aggressive on rear camber for a number of reasons. If you mostly drive the car lightly loaded on motorways with little hard cornering then this can often happen.
When it goes on a hunter/ geo rig, it will give a green tolerance band. This is often misunderstood even by dealer technicians. It's not 'anywhere in the green is ok'. For example rear left at one end of the camber limit and the rear right on the other limit will give a sheet that shows 'all ok/green' but the car will pull to the side with more camber. This pull then causes miss diagnosis of a toe issue etc...
Some simple rules should be followed:
1. Cross camber (left to right difference) should be less than 0.2 deg.
2. Cross toe should be less than 3 minutes
3. Cross caster within 0.5 deg
4. Middle of camber band for drivers with mixed road, load and driving styles.
Max of band for B road only 'enthusiastic' drivers.
Minimum camber band settings for motorway, gentle driving and light loads.
A good geo tech should discuss what of the above is most like you and set it up accordingly, following rules 1-3.
MY SUGGESTION: go to a reputable dealer with a hunter rig - https://www.alignmycar.co.uk/
Explain on the phone you've been having since issues and been given some advice... ask if they are willing to do an 'extra picky' set up for you that meets the above rules. Anywhere that says no has no place doing the job anyway, anywhere that says of course is good.
Ask for the rear to see set with both tyres on the minimum camber and toe limits. Sleek ensure they check the inner control arm bushes for wear and cracking on the rubber.
If this does not fix your issue I'll owe you a pint.
Sorry for sending most of you to sleep. Bravo for those still reading.
Really interesting thanks for sharing that. One thing I've never really understood with vehicle alignment is how very little out of adjustment is needed to cause some severe tyre wear. On the flip side of that we've had customers rock up with suspension arms almost falling off with very little tyre wear.
Used to see it all the time on Mercs when I worked on the tyre desk for several major lease companies.
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Your welcome. Those odd small issues are normally bushing issues that cause the alignment in real driving to vary greatly from what you see on the ramp. Top culprates are normally the tension arm inner (lower forward link, front and rear axle, so called because it is under tension during braking). These are often hydraulic bushes with a number of internal oil chambers. If one of these fail you can get massive (think 30 mins/ half degree) variation in toe and camber on the road, but they often only fail internally and show no leaks.
The lateral (other lower link - takes most of the lateral cornering loads) is normally a solid rubber bush that is much more hardy, but is the next to go. If this one has worn, the tension bush is almost always gone inside.
I imagen trying to explain any if this to a retail customer a very tall order however!
The suspension set up you are describing is exactly what we experience on a regular basis.
LR D4 have lower suspension arms with a fixed front bush but have a rear lower hydra bush in the rear housing. These take a beating under braking and most people find you're lucky to get 3 years tops out of even a genuine set of arms. Wear is not bad enough to fail an MOT and indeed from the outside you would say there is nothing wrong. Under sharp braking they allow the arm to contact the lower subframe and you get a hollow knock, are also apparent over bumps, these cause virtually any tyre wear.
Same can can be said for the rear upper arms later ones have an olive style bush earlier ones are standard. These totally collapse and can give you about 3-5 inches of movement in the rear wheel....again most of the time show very little tyre wear. Considering what must be going on when driving and cornering it doesn't really stack up there's so little tyre wear.
Some cars when getting geo done require a certain fuel load and weight placed in the car to simulate normal driving conditions, pretty sure BMW and Merc are two? I've had custom geo settings with extra camber but never worn tyres like that. A lot does depend on how good the rig operator is when getting it set, some are not at all very capable and don't check the condition of the suspension etc before testing, could you get a recommendation from an owners club for someone local to you.?
A wheel with lots of play will often follow the path of least resistance and therefore not often cause uneven wear, although overall wear is likely to be increased. A solid wheel held in a firm position is much more likely to cause localised/uneven wear.
Think of it a bit like correcting an oversteer situation, the best course of actions is to let go of the steering and allow the car to straighten itself up, this is what’s happening when the wheel has play vs gripping the steering wheel hard, car won’t find its natural path of least resistance.
Thank you for this. There are a bunch of alignment places on that link that are not too far from me so I’ll start calling around.
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