Tutorial on Vehicle Alignment
The alignment of your vehicle's tires refers to the way in which they are positioned with respect to the other tires, the road and the vehicle body. Misaligned tires will cause uneven wear of the tire treads, which may cause them to wear out sooner than if the tires were all receiving even use. Poor tire alignment can also make your vehicle more difficult to control and less fuel efficient. Many components of tire alignment can be checked by the vehicle owner, such as toe and camber, without requiring a trip to the mechanic's shop.
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Instructions
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Inspect the wear pattern on either of your vehicle's front tires to get an initial reading on alignment. Uneven wear across any part of the treads indicates an alignment problem. Look for a pattern that makes the individual treads look like the teeth of a saw. This pattern, known as the sawtooth pattern, is the result of beveled wear on each individual tread, which indicates a problem with the vehicle's toe. Toe refers to whether the front tires are pointed inward toward each other or away from each other.
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Determine whether your vehicle has too much toe-in or toe-out by examining the sawtooth pattern more closely. Look at the point of each sawtooth-shaped tread. If the point is facing into the vehicle's frame, the front wheels are pointed too far inward. This indicates the alignment has too much toe-in. If the points are facing out away from the frame, the alignment has more toe-out than it should.
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Measure toe by measuring the distance from the middle of the backside of the front two tires and subtracting it from the distance from the middle of the front side of the front two tires. A negative number means your vehicle has toe-in. A positive number means your car has toe-out.
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Inspect the wear pattern on any one of your four tires for signs of cross-tire beveling. Cross-tire beveling means that one side of the tire, either the left or right side, shows significantly greater wear than the other side. This indicates a problem with camber, which is whether or not the tire is sitting perpendicular to the road.
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Measure camber in degrees by placing a level up to the car's tire when it is parked on a flat surface. The tire should be at 90 degrees, completely perpendicular to the ground.
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Tips & Warnings
Refer to your car's owner's guide to see if some toe-in is allowed on your vehicle to improve the handling of the car. The manual will specify the amount of toe-in that is permitted.
References
- Photo Credit tire image by timur1970 from Fotolia.com
