front inner tyre wear...?

[Zip]

Hi,

Rather disturbingly, both my fronts are showing a bit of canvas along the inside edges, the rest of the tyres with plenty of tread left.

Just ordered myself a couple or PilotSports to replace them with, but would be keen to understand why they are wearing like this, or is it just a Audi S8 "feature"?

Some of my lower front bushes are quite hard and cracking....would this contibute?

Zip

[Dezzy]

They seem to suffer from too much camber on the front, and it isn't adjustable. I over came this by having the toe set IN slightly to compensate and wear right across the tyre.
It could be the arms showing there age or the constant S not set correctly when tracked.

[Adrian E]

As Dezzy has said really - if you're doing a lot of town work it'll make it worse. My fronts lasted about 16k miles and weren't down to the cords - that involved a lot of town driving too. It's definitely worth rotating tyres diagonally if they're replaced as a set of 4. If replacing pairs get the new tyres fitted on the back first and they will last longer once swapped to the front.

Worth getting a proper alignment check done and worn arms will give dynamic changes in suspension setup which won't be picked up on a static alignment so if you know they're shagged it's probably best to get them changed before paying 2 hours labour for an alignment to be done.

[Zip]

...so why do whole arms get changed, and not just new bushes pressed in??? How do the arms "wear"? They're solid bit sof metal!

Zip

[Dezzy]

You can get the bushes and press them in if you want to. I bought cheap ebay arms and changed them on the drive one side at a time. The bushes i couldn't buy for the price i paid the full set of cheap arms and my press is an engineers vice :o. So for me i swapped out a side at a time.

[Adrian E]

...so why do whole arms get changed, and not just new bushes pressed in??? How do the arms "wear"? They're solid bit sof metal!

Zip

By arms worn I mean the bushes - problem is the bill to replace the bushes on existing arms (and risk that balljoints where fitted are worn as well) will be higher in labour than cost of complete replacement arms. Different if you're doing the work yourself but you'll end a hydraulic press I suspect

Have a search for Meyle on here and there's threads about replacement options. Mine's coming up to 60k miles and has had all 4 upper arms done but lower arms are all original still

[Sir WIll]

Just been in to replace the rear tyres as they were wearing low especially on the outside edges.

Checked the front tyres and guess what!

Front tyres have 2 to 3mm across the main part of the rubber no problem, very inside edge that you can hardly see just down to the cords!

Arms are all pretty recent so time to up the psi from 36 to 40 and find a good local company to do the alignment (Constant S and I have been reading all about!)

[Goran]

My previous S8 was suffering the exact same inside wear on the front tyres, however I new it was misaligned after having some work done. I got a new set of tyres, and a proper alignment at Audi and it didn't do it since. Now the same tyres are on my new S8 and still wearing reasonably evenly.
I don't know how helpful this is.

[Sir WIll]

I certainly would not trust Kwik Fit for the alignment, it would be interesting to know how much Audi charged you to do it?

[tintin]

I had the same problem with my s8 for my first couple of years, and went through several sets of fronts surprisingly quickly. Since then, I've got my local Kwikfit to do the alignment on their Hunter alignment machine every year, and the tyres have been fine since - a worthwhile investment of c.£50 from memory, and I've always found Kwikfit to be excellent.

[Sir WIll]

I shall withdraw my comments on Kiwkfit, I never thought they would be that good at alligment.

For the sake of £50 I agree it would be money well spent.

Also to give them credit the mobile fitter was excellent.

[tintin]

No need to withdraw them…everywhere is different, I just happen to have a very good one!

[Goran]

At the local dealer it was something like £220. I dont remember the exact amount, but it was over £200 and under £300.

[Adrian E]

2 hours labour at my local indy, using the genuine Audi equipment. Labour rate is circa £60/hr

[The_Laird]

Some time ago I took mine in to A4 Audi (local indy) and they farmed it out to Kwik Fit as their machine was broken. When I got the car back, the steering wheel was a mile off centre!
Cost around £70 IIRC.

[goldsax]

sorry to dive in so late into the thread.
the kwik fit Hunter alignment system is well regarded and i have used K fit for alignment regularly. not all K fits have this though. check before you go there.
as re. wheel balancing etc. K Fit are totally hit and miss, took may SL there 1 year ago which made the balance worse so on my drive home i went to another K fit 2 miles in the other direction who rebalance free of charge .. perfect!