Near perfect alignment - Terrible inner tire wear

[Harriz801]

Well, after a winter of driving roughly 7,000 miles on winter tires, I pulled my wheels off today and was shocked at the amount of inner tire wear I had.

Before i get started let me state a few things.
1. I researched my alignment information through the forums
2. I set my numbers as close to what Old Guy's recommendations are in his thread (Thanks Old Guy, your info is great) - http://www.audizine.com/forum/showth...-Lowered-B6-A4
3. Both my front and rear subframes are centered as best I could get them.
4. The alignment was performed on a brand new Hunter rack, by a good friend of mine at the Acura dealer.
5. Tires on the rear of the car appeared to be wearing more evenly, until they were rotated to the front, and then were severely worn on the inside edges.
6. All suspension components were torqued in their weighted position.

Suspenison specs:
Front fender to ground clearance = 24 5/8
Rear fender to ground clearance = 24 7/8
Koni Coilovers with 11,000 miles
All suspension bushings / control arms / sway bar links / wheel bearings - entire front suspension & most of rear replaced with OEM parts 11,000 miles ago
Stock front upper control arms - I do own a set of Stern adjustable arms that could be installed if need be

Here are my after measurements of the new alignment:




Here are a few tire pictures:





I know that having two degrees of negative camber on the front suspension will eventually cause some of the inner tire wear, but it can't as severe as what I just found? As most of my research as led me, most inner tire wear issues are due to bad toe settings, and adding negative camber on top of that will make it even worse but my toe settings are damn near zero! As stated above, I have a set of Stern upper control arms that can go on at anytime.

Does anyone think the soft winter tire compound is just accelerating the issue?

If anyone could provide any suggestions, they would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks guys!

[1killera4]

I have the same issue. :(

[supple]

Not an expert in alignment but if you run winters above 50+F it can accelerate this. I had this issue before I got mine realigned to the OEM sport suspension settings. On top of the sheet that's noted by the 1BE. Not sure what the difference is but I can post my sheet later.

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[typeslone]

Unfortunately poor tire wear is a characteristic of quattro audi's whether stock or lowered.

My personal opinion is that your alignment setting are not near perfect, its perfect in the sense that drivers and passenger side are near identical but that is about it.
You said you have stern arms that you could install in the front, I would install those and try and get the front camber somewhere in the range of -1.0'. That much camber mixed with toe in or toe out will drag the tire more than you realize. I am sure having soft snow tires doesn't help either. I think the rear camber is fine, I have my car set to about the same rear camber actually, its pretty close to what the factory wants also. I have my front camber evened out side to side with -0.9' on stock arms with bilstein sports/eibach springs. I have no idea what my ftg number are, I have never cared enough to measure it. I do all my own alignments on a newer hunter machine here at the dealer I work for.

As for you toe, on the front end, I would toe them out a little more than what you have them at, I would actually try and set it to zero toe, if not try 0.01' or 0.02'. I read what was posted in the other thread and from my experience I don't think our cars wonder when set to zero toe but every car is different and roads conditions are different everywhere also. I live in NJ near NYC, our roads suck, I can only imagine how bad Michigan roads are. A hair of toe in is fine though, when the front end lifts under load, it will actually change the geometry closer to a zero toe setting. We actually toe in all our drag cars so when you launch and accelerate down the track, you are at 0 toe. As for the rear, your total toe is off enough to where I feel it should be adjusted. I have messed with various front end settings on my car to see handling changes and tie wear changes but honestly in the rear I haven't played with the settings. I normally just try and get the camber and toe right in the middle of the specified range. I recommend the same for your rear toe, like I said earlier, your rear camber is pretty close already. Good luck and feel free to ask questions.

[dba4]

i need an alignment i have the same issue and will have the toe set at 0

[1killera4]

Do the upper control arms being worn have an affect on side wear?

[fly300kts]

Do the upper control arms being worn have an affect on side wear?

LOL OH YEAH

Phil

[1killera4]

LOL OH YEAH

Phil

And there ya have it.

[Okedokey]

So you went to all that trouble and didn't replace uppers? Strange but ok. Also check the inflation.

[pezgoon]

LOL OH YEAH

Phil

I lol'd




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[Harriz801]

Thanks for all the replies guys!

Not an expert in alignment but if you run winters above 50+F it can accelerate this. I had this issue before I got mine realigned to the OEM sport suspension settings. On top of the sheet that's noted by the 1BE. Not sure what the difference is but I can post my sheet later.

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I agree, the soft tire compound is definitely accelerating the wear, as until yesterday I didn't get a chance to change out to the summers and we've had multiple days over 50 degrees. According to the top of my alignment sheet, it was loaded with default settings from the 1BA/1BB suspension. I'm not exactly sure about this, but I thought this just loaded the factory ranges for the toe / camber / caster settings, correct? If thats the case, we were shooting for specific numbers anyway so those ranges wouldn't matter correct?

Unfortunately poor tire wear is a characteristic of quattro audi's whether stock or lowered.

My personal opinion is that your alignment setting are not near perfect, its perfect in the sense that drivers and passenger side are near identical but that is about it.
You said you have stern arms that you could install in the front, I would install those and try and get the front camber somewhere in the range of -1.0'. That much camber mixed with toe in or toe out will drag the tire more than you realize. I am sure having soft snow tires doesn't help either. I think the rear camber is fine, I have my car set to about the same rear camber actually, its pretty close to what the factory wants also. I have my front camber evened out side to side with -0.9' on stock arms with bilstein sports/eibach springs. I have no idea what my ftg number are, I have never cared enough to measure it. I do all my own alignments on a newer hunter machine here at the dealer I work for.

As for you toe, on the front end, I would toe them out a little more than what you have them at, I would actually try and set it to zero toe, if not try 0.01' or 0.02'. I read what was posted in the other thread and from my experience I don't think our cars wonder when set to zero toe but every car is different and roads conditions are different everywhere also. I live in NJ near NYC, our roads suck, I can only imagine how bad Michigan roads are. A hair of toe in is fine though, when the front end lifts under load, it will actually change the geometry closer to a zero toe setting. We actually toe in all our drag cars so when you launch and accelerate down the track, you are at 0 toe. As for the rear, your total toe is off enough to where I feel it should be adjusted. I have messed with various front end settings on my car to see handling changes and tie wear changes but honestly in the rear I haven't played with the settings. I normally just try and get the camber and toe right in the middle of the specified range. I recommend the same for your rear toe, like I said earlier, your rear camber is pretty close already. Good luck and feel free to ask questions.

I agree with you that the -2.0 degrees negative camber is contributing to the tire wear. As far as the toe settings, I was just going off of what Old Guy's thread was referencing and it sure sounded to me like he was achieving some great results with those numbers over the course of a long period of time. The only difference between Old Guys alignment settings and mine is our FTG measurements, and in my case a bit more negative camber due to the FTG height difference. My car is setting 3/8" lower in the front than what his is. He is running -1.7 degrees front camber and I am running roughly -2.0 degrees front camber.

Michigan roads are pretty bad, but the reason I didn't set the toe any closer to zero was to prevent tramlining like you were referencing. I'd be curious to hear what your FTG measurements are? Also wondering how long you have been running the alignment specs your referencing and what kind of tire wear your experiencing?

So you went to all that trouble and didn't replace uppers? Strange but ok. Also check the inflation.

I've always had all four tires set to 32 psi. The reason the upper control arms weren't replaced when I did all my suspension work was I wanted to see what kind of negative camber I would have with the stock arm at my FTG height. It was just for reference. If it was close enough to stock camber, I planned to install a new set of OEM upper arms or if it was far enough out of spec I planned to install the Stern arms.

[Harriz801]

I also wanted to reference the information that was sent to me through a PM from Old Guy directly:

The softer winter tire compound will wear a little bit faster but not to the extreme that you are experiencing.

Other than the -2° of camber those settings are pretty much what work for me. I'm at 25" FTG with -1.7° of camber. Did you make the raised toe adjustment and move the tie rod as far down in the slat as it would go? Are your tires set to the recommended pressures listed on the door frame placard?

If the answer is yes to those questions you may be getting lower than the raised toe adjustment can accommodate and consequently you are getting additional scrubbing. If this is the case your two options. Install the Sterns and reduce the camber. This won't reduce the raised to scrubbing but it will distribute it more evenly across the whole tire instead of concentrating it all on the edge. The other option would be to raise your ride height a little.

Good luck! Please keep me posted with what you find. It would be good information to add to the alignment thread for those facing the same situation.

To answer his questions, yes I moved the tie rod ends as low as I could possibly get them in the spindle, and again running 32psi in all tires.

I think Old Guy and others are correct, I'll either be forced into raising the FTG height, or installing the Stern upper control arms to reduce the negative camber.

Whats odd to me though, I'm running more toe in on the rear of the car, with close to the same camber (0.5 degree difference) and the front suspension is what appears to be causing the inner tire wear?

[old guy]

The reason you see more wear on the front tire inner edge than the rear tire inner edge is because of what is called "bump steer". This is what you are trying to mitigate by making the raised toe (aka curve toe) adjustment. The raised toe adjustment was designed to account for the differences between the three different ride heights available. Only two heights are available in the States. Standard and Sport. Unfortunately it can only adjust down so far.

Here's a more detailed explanation that I recently posted in the A5 forum:

Caveat: Comments are from years of use and 200k miles of driving on my A4 B6. The OEM specs for the B6 are similar to the B8. The A5/S5 calls for slightly more camber than the B6. Wear from high camber can be mitigated by adjusting other parameters such as the toe, raised toe, and tire pressures. I have been running -1.7° camber per side on my B6 and still get 50k miles of even wear out of the DWS-06’s.

As the camber increases the toe has to decrease. If you stick with the factory toe specs you WILL experience inner edge tire wear. Adjusting the raised toe can also make a significant difference. As you lower the body of the car you change the angle of the tie rod arms. The more you get away from level the more you increase the scrub as the suspension travels up and down.

When starting for a level position any movement above or below level or neutral serves to shorten the effective length of the tie rod arm. This in turn moves your toe setting from toe-in to neutral as the body goes up or down past the neutral position.

When you lower the body of the car you essentially shorten the effective length of the tie rod arm so you have to adjust it accordingly to get the proper toe. If you do not compensate a little by adjusting the raised toe the steering geometry changes considerably.

As you drive with suspension that has been lowered the effective length of the tie rod arm acts a little different. Since it is starting away from neutral any movement of the body downward shortens the effective length at a greater rate than from the neutral starting point. This moves you from a toe in position toward neutral toe.

However, when the body of the car moves upward the effective length of the tie rod arm increases as you approach the level or neutral point. Instead of pushing your toe toward zero it actually increases your toe.

This up and down movement creates a constant scrubbing of the tire. Especially if you are running the factory toe specs. By setting the toe close to zero you can minimize this scrub. You also need to keep your tire inflation pressures to no more than the recommended amount. Higher pressures stiffen up the sidewalls and combined with the increased camber and increased scrub the inner edge of your tires don’t have a chance of survival.

Three things: Zero toe, adjust the raised toe as far down as possible and don’t over-inflate your tires.

[Okedokey]

I would've thought PM is PM, not sure how cool it is to post people's PMs public, i wouldn't do it.

Nice post old guy, if only i had a clue how to interpret it :)

[aluthman]

I would have told the alignment shop to try again if they gave me those results. Replace any worn suspension components you have, take off the snows since it's warming up, and get a good alignment and have the toe set to as close to zero as they can get it. Also, keep on top of checking tire pressure.

[old guy]

I would've thought PM is PM, not sure how cool it is to post people's PMs public, i wouldn't do it.

Nice post old guy, if only i had a clue how to interpret it :)

I have no problem with Harriz801 posting my PM. When he PM'd me he asked if I could reply to his post. I meant to do just that but replied to his PM instead.

[Harriz801]

The reason you see more wear on the front tire inner edge than the rear tire inner edge is because of what is called "bump steer". This is what you are trying to mitigate by making the raised toe (aka curve toe) adjustment. The raised toe adjustment was designed to account for the differences between the three different ride heights available. Only two heights are available in the States. Standard and Sport. Unfortunately it can only adjust down so far.

Here's a more detailed explanation that I recently posted in the A5 forum:

Caveat: Comments are from years of use and 200k miles of driving on my A4 B6. The OEM specs for the B6 are similar to the B8. The A5/S5 calls for slightly more camber than the B6. Wear from high camber can be mitigated by adjusting other parameters such as the toe, raised toe, and tire pressures. I have been running -1.7° camber per side on my B6 and still get 50k miles of even wear out of the DWS-06’s.

As the camber increases the toe has to decrease. If you stick with the factory toe specs you WILL experience inner edge tire wear. Adjusting the raised toe can also make a significant difference. As you lower the body of the car you change the angle of the tie rod arms. The more you get away from level the more you increase the scrub as the suspension travels up and down.

When starting for a level position any movement above or below level or neutral serves to shorten the effective length of the tie rod arm. This in turn moves your toe setting from toe-in to neutral as the body goes up or down past the neutral position.

When you lower the body of the car you essentially shorten the effective length of the tie rod arm so you have to adjust it accordingly to get the proper toe. If you do not compensate a little by adjusting the raised toe the steering geometry changes considerably.

As you drive with suspension that has been lowered the effective length of the tie rod arm acts a little different. Since it is starting away from neutral any movement of the body downward shortens the effective length at a greater rate than from the neutral starting point. This moves you from a toe in position toward neutral toe.

However, when the body of the car moves upward the effective length of the tie rod arm increases as you approach the level or neutral point. Instead of pushing your toe toward zero it actually increases your toe.

This up and down movement creates a constant scrubbing of the tire. Especially if you are running the factory toe specs. By setting the toe close to zero you can minimize this scrub. You also need to keep your tire inflation pressures to no more than the recommended amount. Higher pressures stiffen up the sidewalls and combined with the increased camber and increased scrub the inner edge of your tires don’t have a chance of survival.

Three things: Zero toe, adjust the raised toe as far down as possible and don’t over-inflate your tires.

Thanks for the additional information Old Man

I have no problem with Harriz801 posting my PM. When he PM'd me he asked if I could reply to his post. I meant to do just that but replied to his PM instead.

And also thanks for taking the time to clear this up. I was just trying to share useful information on the forum for others with the same question down the road.

I would have told the alignment shop to try again if they gave me those results. Replace any worn suspension components you have, take off the snows since it's warming up, and get a good alignment and have the toe set to as close to zero as they can get it. Also, keep on top of checking tire pressure.

What kind of alignment numbers are use using and what kind of tire wear are you experiencing? When we did the alignment I was using Old Guys recommendations for alignment specs based upon what seems to be the 200k miles he's logged and countless time he's invested into getting good tire wear. As far as getting the toe closer to zero, it doesn't get to much closer than this without creating tramline problems, correct (.05 degrees - front)? As far as the OEM spec on toe, I'm even closer to zero here than what the OEM range is.

Thanks for posting the information, looking forward to hearing what kind of numbers your running.

[aluthman]

Stock specs with toe at about .02. My camber is about -1.5 on each side. I got 40k of even wear out of my last set of shitty all seasons with close to that on my blizzaks.

[dalmation53]

Just got my alignment yesterday how do this specs look?

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[vvenom800tt]

That alignment sucks. Id go back and tell them Toe = 0

[Harriz801]

Stock specs with toe at about .02. My camber is about -1.5 on each side. I got 40k of even wear out of my last set of shitty all seasons with close to that on my blizzaks.

Interesting, are you feeling any tramlining when driving down the road? I assume were talking .02 degrees of toe IN correct? Is this what your running for both front and rear toe? If this is the case, then the difference between our two alignments is your running a minimal amount less of toe in than I am, with about a 0.5 degree difference of front camber. Sounds like ill be installing the adjustable arms and seeing how the summer tires wear.

Just got my alignment yesterday how do this specs look?

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It seems there may be differing opinions and different things that work for others but I think we would all agree that the alignment you were just given was nothing but the standard toe and go..... Meaning, they only adjusted your toe on all four corners and took it back off the rack. Theres still tons of cross camber in the front and they didnt even touch the easily adjustable rear camber, not something I would accept thats for sure!

[Harriz801]

That alignment sucks. Id go back and tell them Toe = 0

Are you replying to my alignment numbers or Dalmation?

[VAGlover]

I would definitely check the condition of the upper and lower control arm bushings and then set allignment to the specs Old Guy posted, 0 toe and adjust the bump steer down as much as possible. And of course, make sure tire pressures are at cold temp spec.


For this bushings, you should be checking for large cracks and tears. The lower control arms should be very stiff if you put channel locks on the control arm and try to twist.


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[vvenom800tt]

- - - Updated - - -

Are you replying to my alignment numbers or Dalmation?

Dalmations

[dalmation53]

Damn guys i told the guy to set the toe to 0 but he said that a little bit of toe for these cars were better because the roads were never flat. And the car is tracking straight and even the steering wheel is dead center.

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[Harriz801]

I would definitely check the condition of the upper and lower control arm bushings and then set allignment to the specs Old Guy posted, 0 toe and adjust the bump steer down as much as possible. And of course, make sure tire pressures are at cold temp spec.


For this bushings, you should be checking for large cracks and tears. The lower control arms should be very stiff if you put channel locks on the control arm and try to twist.

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Thanks for the suggestions. All of my suspension components were just replaced with OEM parts. Everything but the upper control arms. The upper control arms were kept stock to just see what kind of camber the stock arms provide at my FTG height, then I was going to either buy new OEM upper arms if the camber was acceptable or install the Stern upper control arms that I already have. Bump steer was set to Old Guys recommendations (Lowest in the spindle) and toe numbers were set to Old Guys exact numbers before the alignment was performed.

[Harriz801]

Progress update:

Parts just showed up, changed my mind on installing the Stern control arms and going with a set of 034 adjustable control arms instead:


Today ill be installing the adjustable control arms and swapping out my Koni Coilovers for a set of KW V2's. When removing the Koni's off of the car, I noticed my upper shock bracket looked like this:


I doubt this is a contributing factor to my inner tire wear but I thought I would post a picture of it to get everyones thoughts? It appears the aluminum cup is only there to hold the bump stop in this position, and if I am correct, this shouldn't have an effect on my tire wear? One thing to note is, I am able to spin the upper spring seat rubber freely (this is attached to the aluminum cup I'm referring to). Is this normal?

I know I could replace the entire upper shock bracket with this: https://www.ecstuning.com/b-genuine-...ch/8e0412391c/ - But the price seems a bit crazy for a part that only holds the bump stop. I think I saw they were a bit cheaper on GAP.

Thanks guys

[typeslone]

I had the same thing happen to my upper spring seat somewhere around 160K miles ,60k of that on eibach springs/bilstein sport shocks. I had no ill effects from it short of a really annoying rubbing noise. In my near 15 years of working on VW/Audi cars, I have changed about 10 of those spring perches on B6/B7 cars for that same reason, everyone of them had some sort of coilover or spring/strut combo. I always wondered what the hell causes them to crack like that? The spring really doesn't put a load on that area and the bumpstop is the only thing that really touches it. Even though a bumpstop is soft, I guess years of suspension travel and bottoming out much damage then somehow.

[Harriz801]

I had the same thing happen to my upper spring seat somewhere around 160K miles ,60k of that on eibach springs/bilstein sport shocks. I had no ill effects from it short of a really annoying rubbing noise. In my near 15 years of working on VW/Audi cars, I have changed about 10 of those spring perches on B6/B7 cars for that same reason, everyone of them had some sort of coilover or spring/strut combo. I always wondered what the hell causes them to crack like that? The spring really doesn't put a load on that area and the bumpstop is the only thing that really touches it. Even though a bumpstop is soft, I guess years of suspension travel and bottoming out much damage then somehow.

I wondered the same thing your thinking, how are these things cracking? My car had stock suspension on it up until 180k. When your replacing these are you able to just get the aluminum cup or are you replacing the entire upper strut bracket?

[typeslone]

Sadly you have to replace the whole upper strut mount/spring perch bracket.


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[Harriz801]

Sadly you have to replace the whole upper strut mount/spring perch bracket.


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Thanks for the info, looking around for the best price on them right now. The dealer sure didn't want to budge!

[typeslone]

I ended up buying a low mileage used one for my own car


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[Harriz801]

I ended up buying a low mileage used one for my own car


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I considered this option as well, but finding a low mileage B6 or B7 in a part out anymore is getting pretty rare and for the sake of time, I had to end up ordering both sides new.

For those who need the information:
If you haven't replaced these upper shock brackets before, the original bracket part number (8E0412383C) has been revised to 8E0412391C. As Typeslone mentioned above, to replace the cracking aluminum cup, you have to purchase the entire bracket.