Excessive tire wear, need some input...

[TomRhere]

'86 BRAT bone stock as far as suspension and tires, (185/70-13 M&S).

 

Back in late June, early July I put newish tires on the fronts. I aslo replaced ball-joints and outer tie-rod ends, (old ones were worn and showed some sloppiness), on both sides.. Did not notice any slop or uncalled for movement in the lower control arm or radius rod bushings or in the strut caps, so I didn't swap any of those parts....

 

I drive roughly 370 miles a week to/from work, so I've put a couple thousand miles on the tires since mounting them. Now, I'm seeing the outer edge of the PS tire is worn down, almost to the belt... Not good....

 

Looking at the front of the BRAT, both tires appear to be standing the same and both pointing straight ahead. Very slight pull to the left when driving straight on some roads, none on other roads, (thinking crown of the road has something to do there). I do get an oscillating shimmy in the steering wheel if I drive anything above 65mph, more of an annoyance than anything else. I have noticed that it gets real skittish if there's any ponding of water in the road from a heavy rain. That gets scary at times, and tells me something is amiss in the front end.

 

Thought I knew steering/suspension stuff pretty good. I can usually locate issues and do the repair needed. I also do a pretty darn good job of eyeball aligning the steering stuff before it goes on the rack.

 

I'm stumped here... Got any ideas???

[Indrid cold]

Ive got a Brat doing the same thing. Input from others are to replace leading rod rubber bushings, sway bar rubber bushings and the Transverse link bushings and possibly front strut may be bent.... although I havn't had time too do this I have the parts ready to go in....I am taking the shot gun approach, going to change it all.

 

any way.. it seems that these bushing become worn, old etc.. and no longer supports front end...

 

When the rubber bushings parts are tightened they should be torquered with the weight on the tires not dangling in air on jacks per others suggestions which properly loads the bushings.... or something to that effect.

 

Also, it is possible to build new camber/toe plates on top of front sruts to tweek alignment both ways should it tweeked out of tollerance.. but that is another post...

 

Hope some of this helps...

 

NOOB in training...

[GeneralDisorder]

My Brat has the same problem on both front wheels. I don't drive it much right now so I haven't got around to fixing it, but my assumption is it's probably a combination of bad leading rod bushings, control arm bushings, and loose ball joints. The net effect is that the bottom of the wheel tucks under too far in turns, allowing the tire to ride up on it's outer edge.

 

I've bent EA81 struts, and they generally bend the *other* direction, and it pushes the top of the tire inward. That and I don't off-road the Brat so I know they aren't bent.

 

One thing I've noticed is the 2WD EA81's don't seem to do this, and neither do the ones with power steering - the commonality there is the strut tops are reversed. I wonder if turning the strut tops around would help matters? Just a thought.

 

GD

[TomRhere]

I'll have to check the strut top on the PS to see if maybe it was put in wrong. I've found other things done on this BRAT that wasn't right, mostly on the PS, so maybe...

 

I have new control arm bushings, and one set of radius rod bushings, so I'll swap those in, and get another set on the way for the DS.

(Why they sell the radius rod bushing seperately instead of as a pair like one needs is beyond me. I ordered 2 thinking a set each side instead of 2 being just for one side. Grrrrrr...) Those parts were bought for the rebuild of the '82 BRAT and have been laying around for awhile.

Need to get this fixed so I can get new tires all around before the white stuff starts falling. Sloppy steering and slippery roads don't mix to well.

 

Thanks for the input.