One of my front tires is wearing unusually..... I have included some pictures with descriptions to try to show you what is going on.... Any ideas as to the cause would be appreciated because it is getting new tires tomorrow.

(I will put pictures here once an admin lets them through.)

 

Got the pictures:





Thanks.

Trey

 

Can you get a pic a little further away and straight on. The tire looks like it is angled (vertically) more then it should be.

Randy

 

front end is slightly toed out, your shocks are probably getting weak, your track bar may need some attention, and you need to rotate your tires more often.

Not necessarily what you want or need to hear is it? I have had these same troubles with my front tires. biggest culprit to cupping and feathering like that is toe out and shocks. next comes tire rotation,then the track bar wearing will cause it on the right. Inside wear can be caused by worn ball joints, which should be looked at anyway.

I think that almost covers the road I have been down with mine, good luck with the new tires

 

looked into ball joints.... they are fine. next will look into track bar.... shocks are not very old... weight of bumper and winch have any effect on that?

What about tire balance? could that have anything to do with it?

 

I will work on that.... I think you are right.... what causes that?

 

Trey, Back in my Tires Plus days, just about every tire that came in cupped on a solid axle truck was from worn ball joints. Sometimes on the big trucks like ours you have to jack up one side of the front, put a long pipe (about 6 ft so you can get leverage) under the tire and pry up and down and side to side. Have someone watch the ball joints. They may also be towed out a bit. Get the front end in the air and give everything a vigorous shakedown, something has to be loose. Could also get a free alignment check to see how out of whack it is.

 

Ball joints are what hold the spindle on the axle. They should be tilted in at the top some (camber,caster I don't remember right now). This will create wear on the sides that will allow it to move further that way. I have less experiance with ball joints. Most of mine is kingpins. The '00 we had stolen also had massive DW. I check it like I would kingpins and thought they were good. After the third trip to the dealer I had a friend that works on (newer and 4X4) little trucks look at it and like Crimedog said pry under the tire and see how much movment you get. With our truck someone had got the frontend so out of wack trying to align it with bad ball joints it was scary. I would start there. If it is not in the balljoints it could be in the a-arms.

Randy

 

Cups or scalloped dips appearing around the edge of the tread on one side or the other, almost always indicate worn (sometimes bent) suspension parts. Adjustment of wheel alignment alone will seldom cure the problem. Any worn component that connects the wheel to the truck (ball joint, wheel bearing, shock absorber, springs, bushings, etc.) can cause this condition.

 

Thanks Bill, Matt, and everyone else. I will continue looking into the cause of this. Re-checked ball joints using above stated method (jack up front end and attempt to get wheel to move using 7' spud bar...) got no movement using that method..... what is next easiest to check? springs? shocks? bearings?

 

If everything else checks out I would rotate every 5k. Those deep lug tires will cup/wear quicker than all season tires. If I go over 6k on a rotation I will start to wear like your pic show but not that extreme.

 

I'm betting its a bad tie rod end and a sloppy trac bar.

 

I ain't got no stinking Trac Bar, 2WD independant. . .what would it be in my case?

Cheers,
Steve J

 

Dont forget to check your wheel bearings, maybe loose.

 

Mine was doing the same thing. Today I got my tires(BF 35 mudders) rotated and balanced. I can already tell it tracks a lot better and I hope it will fix the problem. Will keep yall posed………Jamie