shutterbug

You don't need to get an alignment with a tire change IF

- there's absolutely no uneven/premature tire wear on your car
- you never hit anything major or hard, slight bump on a curb or bumps on the road is fine, won't harm anything
- your steering wheel is perfectly straight

but if you spend over 1k on 19" tires....why not get a alignment for 80 bucks?

shutterbug

字典仔, you're right, I never had to do any wheel alignment on ANY of my cars...they're all perfect, even with new set of tires, they're perfectly fine.  Of course it's "better" to get one done (like buying insurance), but like I said I have confidence that my cars are fine.  If anyone doesn't know or lacks confidence, then go get one; it only cost 100 bucks!

No offense to you or anything, maybe it's my ignorance, could you tell me why you need a WA if the following is true?  Basically, it means your car is "untouched", how could alignment be "that" bad?  Just want to learn...

- there's absolutely no uneven/premature tire wear on your car
- you never hit anything major or hard, slight bump on a curb or bumps on the road is fine, won't harm anything
- your steering wheel is perfectly straight

[ 本帖最後由 shutterbug 於 2008-9-28 23:36 編輯 ]

shutterbug

CP, the cars that you drive...nobody will "touch" it for 100 bucks la....LOL

shutterbug

原帖由 Catpiano 於 2008-9-29 10:00 發表


Hey SB ..  no name here .. no brand here ...  

LOL...dont' worry...I'm not crazy

shutterbug

字典仔,

I consider hitting something at 30 km/h with the wheel as an "accident" la...and that means HARD to me...imagine 3000+ lbs at 30-40km/h can even kill a kid!

Just for discussion...

The reasons you gave are mostly tied to mechanical wear/failure...so having a WA is fair.  Let say the tie rods are slightly worn, and the car has toe changes (/ \ or \ /), there will be uneven treadwear for sure.  If the suspension sacked over time of use (chamber, caster, etc changed), then there should be uneven wear as well.  Most of changes in WA can be seen on a tire if they're a big enough concern, well, maybe not for "dog tracking" (thrust angle), but I don't think many shops don't even correct that for you for $80 cuz they do the primary angles only.  

Just so other people know, not all these angles are adjustable!  Some cars only allow for one or two types of angle adjustments, now get your moneys worth!  Even you know something is off, it can be the case that you still have to live with it.  If the previously removed tires are absolutely even, the WA can't be off that much and to me it's not a big enough concern, but if you're a perfectionist then by all means get a WA done.

Shops will tell you do it (and they're not completely wrong) but it might not be a must do.  Even after a WA, the car might still not be "perfect", you can only call it "within spec"...left and right could still be different.

my 0.02

feel free to comment on it

shutterbug

Camber does wear tire wor...but it wears it differently than toe.

$90 is not much, but it boils down to if I really need it or not...I can either go get a pointless WA or I can have dim sum

Hm...if people don't know anything or read everything I've typed and just quote me on it then it's their problem.

Like I said, a shop will tell you to do it for insurance...you know some customers who don't know anything will come back and say "my tires wears out so fast after you replaced them, you must did something wrong to my car!".  For me, I will just take the money and go to dim sum...LOL

shutterbug

I'm more than happy with my tire life.  Last car I drove over 200k, just replaced tires once, never did any WA, car drove perfectly fine.  So, 8 tires gave me 200k, not bad huh, who needs a WA?  Yeah, so I'm just gonna save the $$ for my tummy

BTW, anything that is useless and not necessary is EXPENSIVE in my dictionary.  You can say that's cheap but I consider that to be wise spending.

You mentioned about "$40 WA check", what does that include, just check and no adjustment for 4 wheels?

shutterbug

我架車6月返黎 架車上hwy好直
到上個月做左aligment 較返晒d toe
上hwy唔止直  加速輕鬆左  
平時轉彎cut線  我點轉 架車就點轉

Questions:
Where did you car go?  Why does it need to "come back"?  Accident in a body shop before?
Did you notice uneven tire wear?
Did you replace the tires?

如果因為點心
而至其他o既損失就無謂啦

You probably misunderstood me.  If there's really a problem, then yes it's stupid not to do WA.  However, if things are fine, you're wasting your money, better throw that in dim sum lor...  At the end of the day, I guess it depends on the driver's knowledge about cars...

[ 本帖最後由 shutterbug 於 2008-10-1 12:39 編輯 ]

shutterbug

To answer your questions:

- I don't if you consider this slow.  I used to drive 100km rush hour traffic per day 60% hwy and 40% city.  I cruised on hwy at around 120km/h.
- My good old Mystique V6 used to have stock Michelin's MXV4 and Falken's 512.  Of course I got less mileage with Falken cuz they're (only) slightly more grippy.  I was quite surprised with the MXV4 in terms of wet traction and tire life; they last!  Side note, I was still on the first clutch when I sold the car.

The point whether the tire is grippy or not is irrelevant.  When a tires is almost worn down to the indicator and the wear is still even, the alignment shoudl be fine.  Whether it's grippy or not, it just means the length of time that the wear shows up.  With grippy tires, the wear is obvious is a short time of course.

Not bad, $40 to put the heads on for a sanity check.  I have another Civic that probably can use an alignment

shutterbug

原帖由 字典仔 於 2008-10-1 13:24 發表


he just bought an used car, car drives perfectly straight and existing tire doesn't show any uneven wear; all camber angles, caster angles were within .1 to .3 diff and all it was not "within spec"  ...

For a car that I don't have any history about I'd do a WA.  On that part, I agree with you it's good to have one done.

Luckily, I own my cars since new so I know every little thing about it, how it should feel, etc.  That's why I had a problem with that used Camry cuz I don't know how a good one should feel like.

[ 本帖最後由 shutterbug 於 2008-10-1 14:06 編輯 ]