Strange Tire Wear Pattern

[tech10002]

I have the Goodyear Wrangler Silent Armor Pro grade tires on my truck. The two front tires have started to get noisier and noisier, so I took a look at them. They have the most odd wear pattern I've ever seen. The lugs are actually worn down about 1/4" below the one next to it at a 15 degree angle to each other, and the next one over is 1/4" higher from front to back. There is no excessive wear on the sides or center, so I don't see how it could be alignment, and the pressure has always been kept right at spec.

I'll post a couple pics since it's kinda hard to explain. Anybody got any ideas? I'm thinking the tires are defective. They have about 20k on them. I don't even see how it's possible for them to wear this way. The previous set of tires were changed at about 40k and had no unusual wear, and I haven't hit anything that would knock out the alignment.

[slammedSI]

Bad shocks. Seen it a million times when i worked at NTB

[ciscofreak]

Could also be bad ball joints. Seen it many times...

[JBakerFX4]

I'm gonna call that cupping. I've had that happen on a few trucks. Need to rotate the direction. The 8k goodyear AT/S's I put on my truck are starting to show signs like that on the rear. Time to rotate.


Tech- Are you running silent armors on factory 20's!!? what size are they?

[Eric]

"Cupping" or "feathering". Caused by bad shocks or bad alignment. Like previously stated, switch the direction of them and they might wear back normal

[npccpartsman]

Or a combination of shocks and balljoints, both of which from the factory aren't worth crap. Get some Bilstein shocks and moog ball joints and be done with the cupping issue.

[Dave]

Originally Posted by npccpartsman

Or a combination of shocks and balljoints, both of which from the factory aren't worth crap. Get some Bilstein shocks and moog ball joints and be done with the cupping issue.

What Tim said. Its most likely bad ball joints. Same thing happened to my 01

[WEWILLE]

Id bet ball joints too. You can check them by jacking up one tire at a time, probly where the shock mounts to the axle, or just on the axle tube. Then stick a prybar under the tire and pry it up and down, the ball joint shouldnt move in and out. Then grab the top of the tire and push it in and out, it should have no play as well. If either ball joint has more than minor play replace it.

[tech10002]

Bad ball joints with only 60k on the truck? Man they must use some crap if they fail that early.

I'll jack it up as soon as it dries up a little and check that out. The truck sure doesn't ride like the shocks are bad, though.

[Redneck47441]

Could be out of balance make sure you havent lost any wheel wieghts if you have the stick ons wieghts they have a tendency too fall off.