Car came with Goodyear Assurance tires. After around 16K miles, they developed a whirring, roaring sound that increase in pitch with speed, almost as if they were cupped. Too new for bad shocks, I thought. I rotate tires every 6000 miles religiously.
Had an alignment, and dealer said tires were slightly "feathered". Asked him what might cause that, and he said alignment. I would think with regular rotation that shouldn't be a big problem.
Anyone have similar complaint/experience? What can I do, short of replacing the darn things?
I replaced the Goodyear (Eagles?) on my 300m with Dunlop SP5000's, and when they wore out I went with Yokohama Advan S4. The S4 is a very quiet tire. It's billed as an "ultra high performace all season" tire, but I put snows on in the winter.
sounds as if you arent sure that it is the tires causing the noise. Have you rotated them to see if the noise changes? could you be hearing a wheel bearing problem?
Consistent with what others are saying in their replies to you, once a problem like this develops with a given set of tires, it's pretty much impossible to correct that set of tires. Best thing to do is get an alignment now simultaneous with replacing the tires to something not considered "high performance". So-called high performance tires are a very poor value in my opinion (and yes - it is my opinion which anyone is free to disagree with). You pay 2 to 3 times more for a tire that will have 1/2 the tread life of a non-high performance tire, and will likely develop noise problems like this 1/2 way thru that period, and the tire manufacturer will not adjust it no matter what (because they are high performance and that makes it easy for the manufacturer to pretend that you are to blame by abuse, neglect, improper alignment, or anything else they can think of to shift the blame to you, and you have no effective recourse). As I said: Very poor value compared to a nice touring tire IMO.
So yourself a favor and *always* get 'before' and 'after' printouts with your alignments. You will prevent a lot of headscratching and maximize your chances of avoiding this kind of problem. In this particular case, when you do get the new tires and alignment, getting 'before' and 'after' printouts will sove the mystery - at least for you own curiousity - of whether your alignment was out and cause the present problem *OR* that your alingment was in fact fine and the problem is poorly designed tires. This will make you smarter for future tire selections and help you avoid b.s. artists in the tire market.
IMO...
Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')
Yes--you'll note in my original post that I DO rotate every 6,000 miles. The noise just cropped up recently, around 16K miles, after a 1,600 mile trip across country. Rotation right after that did not cure the noise. And, I am certain that the tires are the cause of the noise; two dealers have confirmed that I do NOT have a wheel bearing problem, and one dealer said that the "feathering" would cause the tires to be noisy. He said that driving them would eventually lessen the noise--that's NOT my experience with tires that have developed cupping or feathering over the years, and with many cars.
It used to be that one could have tires "trued"--a process of trimming a small amount of rubber from the tread to eliminate the cupping/feathering; but, no one does that any more.
Hmmm. Link leads to page that says "We were unable to find a match for the Yokohama tire you selected." Perusing all Yokohama tires on Tirerack, I couldn't find one in 225/60/18, the original equip. size on my 300C. Did you use the optional size?
As I said in my other post - kind of an inherent property of so-called hi-performance tires - due to very little siping and large tread blocks that create the cupping. Again - low tread life, almost guaranteed noise halfway thru the otherwise usable low tread life, high initial cost, and absolutely no help from the manufacturer when such problems develop because this kind of problem is accepted in the industry. So why buy them?
Look into Cooper touring tire CS-4. Super quiet, and very good tread life. Approx. $85 each. A bargain in my book. And have your local tire dealer order them in. By the time you pay shipping and extra installation costs (and no one to turn to if problems develop) if ordering from Tire Rack, the seemingly good price for mail order tires doesn't look so hot - better off getting from your local tire dealer who you also get your alignments from (which also reduces finger-pointing if problems develop).
Yep - by the time you pay the labor of the truing process and subtract out the cost of the reduced life of the tires from removing tread depth, you are money ahead by just starting with a new set of tires - *plus* there's a chance that the problem is still there even after the truing. That's why no one does truing anymore.
It seems to me that you knew the answers to your questions before you even posted. :)
Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')
Nope, just gut feelings. Since I don't live in "the big city", I was hoping I could pick the brains of folks who know more than I, maybe those who have been exposed to more advanced technology than that available in RURAL central MO!
My selling dealer is in Columbia, and his techs "didn't hear any noise"; of course, they don't hear it driving only 3 or 4 miles. They don't live with the car. Not like driving 4K miles across country, and putting 20K miles on in a year.
You mentioned Cooper; I have a local dealer who can get Coopers for me. BUT, I had two sets of Cobra's on a 2001 Nissan Altima, BOTH of which developed cupping after some 20K miles, even with alignments, rotation, AND new rear struts. Twice burned, not again.
Re-read what I said about so-called high performance tires. I bet the Coopers you had noise problems with were so-called high performance tires (large tread blocks/very little siping). The CS4 is not of that type.
If you refused to do business with any manufacturer who makes some lines of tires that get noisy (so-called high performance tires), you would have no one to buy tires from. Don't cut off your nose to spite your face (I know - I do the same thing - I swear I'll never buy another Dunlop tire because I had serious noise problems with one of their so-called high performance tires and they refused to make good on them even though nothing I did or didn't do caused the problem).
IOW - Don't rule out a particular manufacturer over *this* problem. Rule out so-called high performance tires from *any* manufacturer that you pay 2 to 3 times as much for and get 1/4 to 1/2 the service life out of and instead get a good touring tire from an otherwise good manufacturer. You'll be money way ahead.
IMO...
Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')
Er, uh...they look alike, except for the emblem on the trunk, and the chrome-backed mirrors on the C (toy?!?!). Oh, well; everyone to their own perversion! :-)
I asked my dealer about front-to-back rotation vs. X-type rotation, remembering that I, too, had always been told radials should NOT be run backwards from their previous mode. His response was that was true with radials many years ago. But, with new belting methods, it doesn't matter any more.
So, I may try your suggestion of reversing their rotation. Since I just had them rotated (dealer did front-to-back) all I need to do is exchange sides.
I know you're in troubleshooting mode right now, but when you are past this problem and do get back to normal tire maintenance, the right way to rotate is to cross the ones that go from back to front, bring the fronts straight back (or vice-versa). By only crossing one pair at a time (and not crossing the other pair), that puts each tire at every position over their life and maximizes the evening out of irregular wear and maximizes the effective tread life. The method I described is called "cross to front". Any good tire shop should know what you mean if you throw that phrase at them. If they give you a dumb look, either find another shop, or explain it to them. The important thing is that you use the same method consistently for a given set of tires. If you mix the mehtods (cross to front and cross to rear), then it messes up the optimization. That's why you tell them the method and not assume which they will use (which also lets them know not to cross both pairs and not to *not* cross them.
There are what are called dierctional tires that cannot be crossed. But that has to do with directional tread pattern (for water shedding) - not tire construction so much. But those tires are clearly marked with an arrow and are not so common in ordinary everyday tires like you and I buy.
Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')
MotorsForum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.