MaxedOut2g

hey guys what up.....i just discovered a major tire problem on my car this evening;
first of all i need to say that i had not rotated my tires in a LONG time, so waiting that long made my problem worse...
second- i have aftermarket Rotora rotors
third- lowered on sprint/kyb-agx
im not sure if 2 and 3 are the culprits but just stating them anyway

ok i started with the right side of my car; i took off both the wheels and i went to show my dad the difference in tread and he noticed something very wrong...on the inside of the front tire, probably about an inch or so, all the way around the tire, the rubber had been taken off, not balded; like i dont know how to explain what had happened (i will hopefully have pictures 2morrow)...but let me try

the inner most part of the wheel, closest to the car itself, was basically missing a chunk 1" deep and 1" in (away from the car) and uniformly cut all the way around, almost as if everytime the tire rotates it is scraping against something and slowly losing rubber;
around...also it was chunked so deep that many many of the threads could be seen

to make things worse, the left front tire was the same, but there was some evidence
a piece of rubber, pretty thin, and about 3-4 inches long was caught between the brake pad and the rotor...also, there was a long piece of rubber, about the same width, but about 18"-24" long sort of wrapped around the rotor and kind of hanging down

i know this is probably like WTF? w/out pictures, but no digicam means no pics; i need my car 2morrow so i just rotated my tires anyway but i also wanna see if there is heavy wear on the tires or it was just the fact that it had been so long that they just continued to wear
im gonna take my wheels off again 2morrow and post pics....if anybody has any insight w/ information provided that would be great....if not hopefully pictures will help...
thank you for reading and i would appreciate any and all suggestions
adarsh

PhxBlue

iTrader: (2)

Get your car up on jacks with the wheels and tires installed and look behind them in the wheel well and find out what your tires are rubbing against. Also look for scuff marks on some of the components directly behind your tires that may indicate the tires are rubbing against it . Those gouges are caused by your tires having contact with something under there. And, DO NOT drive on those tires any more, they are an extreme safety hazard to yourself and others around you if the steel belts are showing like you said, you can easily have tire faliure resulting in blowouts..

G20Flyer

sounds like you have an alignment problem big time. Did you get your car aligned after you installed the new suspension? Probably a toe problem. Camber may have done it depending on how low your drop is.

DAVE Sz

iTrader: (2)

Yeah it's just allignment most likely. Did you get your car alligned when you put on the springs? If not then that COULD be it.

Bman

Misalignment is not going to cause damage like that....

It sounds like you're saying a strip of rubber is being torn out of the tire all the way down to the cords? That's bad.... PhxBlue has it right - stop driving on them immediately and check in the wheel wells for signs of something protruding or bent or anything out of place. Check high up too, because it's possible that the damage only occurs when you hit bumps and the suspension compresses, which would explain why the damage is so narrow.

I haven't seen a lot of tire failures, but I have trouble believing that this is cord separation, delamination, or some other kind of wierd manufacturing defect....

MaxedOut2g

i know ill probably get beaten for this but no, i never got an alignment.....im doing that 2morrow, im also gettting new tires 2morrow, and i will take pictures of my old tires

also, despite your best advice/intentions i had to drive on em, my only justification being that i had no idea anything was wrong b4 i rotated, so just a few more hopefully wont hurt, but i will be off of them asap
...but at the end of the day i found nothing out of the ordinary on my front tires this time though...no abnormal wear...

i also lowered my shock/strut setting to front-2/rear-6 as opposed to front-3/rear-6 yesterday...the reason i did this was because the bottom of the spring mount on the shocks falls pretty close to the top of the tire, but the problem here is that the spring mount is smooth all the way through with no signs of taking a beating from the tires

when i was rotating my tires i looked every where in the wheel well and even ran my hands all the way around the tire w/ it on, or atleast as much as i could get around, and there was nothing in the way....

the last thing im doing to find out whats going on is my new tires will be 235/40/18, as opposed to the 245/40's im running on now....hopefully skinnier tires will help too
the only problem will be when i have to rotate again because th 245s will be up front

thanks for the suggestions guys and i will be getting rid of the tires as soon as i can...
adarsh