2001 Sentra SE pulling to right

I have a 2001 Sentra SE that I recently got new tires for on 16" manufacturer's rims. After the tires were put on, the car pulled to the left so I got an alignment. After the alignment, it still pulled left and the steering wheel vibrated at above 65mph. The tire shop switched my front tires (R to L) and rebalanced my tires and checked the rim balance. After the tires were switched, it pulled to the right so they thought that the tire was bad. So they replaced the tire and rotated back to front (in case it was an uneven rim, it would now be in the back). This did not solve the problem. They also double checked the alignment and the balancing. So after all this, it still pulls right. Any suggestions, ideas?

I will note that I had about 30K miles on the car and outer most tread on the front tires was practically worn off. However, I didn't notice pulling with the old tires, but that doens't mean it wasn't there, but it did previously drive smoother on the highway.

Thanks.

Reply to
xxx
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where was the tread worn on the first set of tires evenly inside outside

Jeff

Reply to
jeff

do you have the alignment specks at the time you had it aligned ?

Reply to
NissTech

It's the tires. They probably replaced the good one rather than the bad one! The fact the -pull- moved when you moved the tires shows this plainly. A rim isn't going to do this.

The vibration is probably a bad tire balance. Seems many tire shops use out of calibration tire balancers due to heavy use? We fix LOTS of balance problems caused by tire stores. Either the people balancing the tires don't know how to properly use the equipment or the equipment is in need of repair.

Same with alignments. It's dificult to find someone who can do something as simple as an alignment correctly. They buy $$$$$ computer aligners and then never calibrate them. The more complex the alignment equipment, the easier it is for it to get knocked out of calibration.

Reply to
Steve T

On the outside of both front tires.

Reply to
xxx

I saw them replace the one that was thought to be bad. When the front tires were switched, the pull switched and that front tire was the one that was replaced. However, after the tire was replaced and the back tires were moved the front, there was still a pull.

The manager of the store said that they balanced it 2 different ways and were balanced. Unfortanetly, I don't have the money to go somewhere else.

Again, I don't have the money to go somewhere else, I just have to keep going back to the same place that is willing to work with me for free.

I have been considering just going back to the tire store and returning the tires and buying a different brand. I am just really unhappy with how the car rides on the highway. I don't think I could deal with it for the next 50K miles.

Reply to
xxx

I am just also curious, the original tires were 195/55/16 (yes, I have the SE model and they have a weird size). It was more economical to get the 205/55/16 tires (which were an alternative size according to the book). However, I was doing some research online and read somewhere that I should have gotten 205/50/16 to make up for the difference larger width. Does anyone have any thoughts on this? And could this be causing my problems?

Reply to
xxx

Sad isn't it?

Reply to
SayWhat

And somewhere around the time of 01/31/2004 00:01, the world stopped and listened as xxx contributed the following to humanity:

If you change the size of the tires, then all *FOUR* tires need to be changed because the car will pull to the smaller tire if both tires are moving at the same speed, which seems to be your case because the Sentra SE is a front wheel drive. This is also murder on your automatic transaxle as well because the differential is working while you are driving down the road trying to compensate. From the sizes that you posted, the tire that should have been moved to the back is not the one that the car is pulling to, but pulling from. If then rotated the tire that is was pulling to, then you will still have the problem.

Do you have anitlock brakes? The controllers are calibrated to operate on a certian circumpherence size of the tire because the speed sensor is usually mounted on a smaller diameter disk, usually on the CV half-shaft at or near the wheel bearing and it must convert the data from the sensor to linear speed, which is directly related to the size of the tire. Yes, this is a safety issue. I would install a new set of tires that are the original size.

Reply to
Daniel Rudy

Thanks for everyone's help. I just wanted to post a follow-up in case anyone in the future has this problem. Although the 205/55's were a recommended cheaper alternative by Nissan, than the original tire size, they did not work for me at all. I finally got tires of the oringal size (195/55/16) and all the problems I was having are gone. No more pulling or shaking. If this is a safety issue, Nissan shouldn't put an odd size tire on their cars and then recommend a cheaper alternative of a different size.

Reply to
xxx

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