Front Tire Wear 2005 Beaver Monterey

[coldcowboy]

I live 38 miles from the Canadian border on the Alaska Hwy at Northway. My front tires are showing inner edge wear and I am seeking advice on who to take it to for a diagnosis. Alignment, balance, king pins etc. Have contacted Alignment Center in Anchorage, unfortunately their sole heavy duty RV guy is out hunting. There is a Freightliner outlet in Anchorage that I emailed and have yet to recieve a response from. Am wondering whether anyone has found a reliable RV repair alignment shop in Alaska, or whether I should plan on stopping in Canada on the way South later this month. Tok, 50 miles North has some repair facilities, has anyone used Willards RV Repair in Tok Alaska? Have hear horror stories of his prices, but have not yet asked if he can do the repair or not.

I would appreciate any and all comments. Anchorage is over 400 miles away and Fairbanks is 250.

Thanks

[wolfe10]

Tell us a little more about the tire wear:

Both fronts wearing only on the insides? Any feathering of the surface of the rest of the tires?

What brand and age tire?

Miles on the tires?

How many miles on the coach, and how much of this was on rough roads?

Has chassis been kept lubed?

You can easily check for steering component wear yourself, with a helper. Helper in driver's seat, engine OFF. Turn steering wheel back and forth through increasing arcs while you look for any play/slop from steering box to right wheel.

You can also check toe-in with just basic things-- Board with nail in it to scribe a mark on the tread as you rotate the wheel with tire off the ground. Then tape measure, long stick, etc to measure from mark on left tire to mark on right tire in front of and then back side of the tire.

[coldcowboy]

Tires are Goodyear, have 57000 miles on the RV about 15000 on these tires. Don't see any feathering on any of the other tires. Travel on rough roads at least 2000 miles the last 2 years. Some on gravel. Chassis was lubed a year ago on arrival at our winter RV park.

Willards RV Repair in Tok is listed on the Good Sam site so can assume they will do a good job. Don't have the facilities here to do much checking, but will try your suggestions. As always thank you very much for your input. i will post what happens.

[hermanmullins]

Cowboy,

Is there a shop near you that can do alignments. It sounds like the camber is out of spec. Is your unit a solid axle or independent front suspension?

IFS can be aligned at most truck centers, while a solid axle requires some heavy equipment.

What make, year and model is your unit. What chassis do you have, Freightliner, Spartan Roadmaster? A contact with the Mfg.'s tech department can get you the specs for the alignment.

Herman

[wolfe10]

Assume this is solid front axle-- given the chassis you have. While camber can be out, it is VERY unlikely, as it would mean that the axle is bent and has to be "straightened".

[hermanmullins]

Also if it is a solid axle then the king pins may be worn.

Herman

[aksafariman]

Hello ColdCowboy. If Anchortown is a bit too much of a drive, you might consider heading down to Whitehorse. When we lived in Fairbanks, I had to take our coach into Anchorage for alignment work, I was able to have our work done at the Goodyear shop. If Anchorage is out, then there are a couple larger truck facilities in Whitehorse that do good work. There's a Kenworth (I believe) dealer at the top of the hill, near the main intersection, who helped us with our Safari and later Country Coach. Google says it's 337 miles down to Whitehorse, which is closer then Anchorage.

William Brown

aka - aksafariman

06 Beaver Monterey Laguna IV

[f330021]

I had basically the same issue. I was told by several tire people that the Goodyear tires had edge wear issues. I paid $200 to have it aligned and the guy said alignment was "Dead On" and that the Goodyear tire were known for that type of wear. Since the guy just had to check the alignment and not make any adjustments, I got him to reduce the cost of the incident.

My big question would be: What is the Model of Goodyear tire that is on the coach's steer axle and the axle's weight

I would not rule out "Camber", or "Toe out" if the tires are wearing on the inside, or an overloaded front axle. The only way to settle the issue is to have the alignment checked: remembering the fact that if they make no adjustments there should only be a charge for checking and not a charge for the complete Alignment service. Don't ask the question before the alignment is checked, because if the tech knows that you ask the question, he can put a wrench to a bolt or nut and it will go into the "Flat Rate" for the complete alignment and the full charge will be applied.

I am not saying that all service operations should not trusted, but I worked at many dealerships over 20 years as a "Salaried Mechanic" and later as a "Service Director" over Parts and Service, and I saw things like this happen at 99% of them by "Flat Rated Mechanics" and or "Techs", even to customers that thought they really knew and trusted the Service Depts.

(I would not work under the flat rate system, because mechs/techs are basically forced to cheat. I always negotiated a salary before going to work at a dealership.) I worked at many Auto/Truck Dealerships, over the years, because I would quit when Dealerships tried to make me part of their dishonest operations!

The "ole" saying "customer beware" applies!

[f330021]

I switched to MICHELIN® XZA2® ENERGY Tires and could not believe the difference in the ride and handling. I asked my wife: "Is it just because I paid a lot for these Michelins or is there that much difference between them and the Goodyears?"

Later she said"I feel like we are riding on a cloud!"

Yes they are more expensive: But in this case you do get what you pay for!

Please note: Goodyear had been very good to us over the years and handled claims quickly and efficiently on our coach and enclosed car trailer, and it was not an easy decision to make: but worth the time, turmoil and long wait!

I might add:

I had already switched, 5years ago, to 315X22.5's on the front of our 04 Monaco Exec due to a 295X22.5 Goodyear blowout on the left front steer axle and the un-availability of the Goodyear 295 RV 670 in the farmlands of Minnesota and could not go down to the available 275 size, due to the steer axle's weight. Our steer axle was upgraded to 16,500 plus due to our heavy battery load behind the fuel tank. We are "Total Electric"; meaning NO PROPANE, which is responsible for most RV fires and the reason Marathon Coach will not put Propane in any of their Prevost Coach conversions.

I buy new tires, when they become 5years old to keep my tires under Mfg warranty.

When it came time to buy tires I also switched to 315's on the drive axle and tag. The change to the 315's made it so that I could actually balance the axle loads to weight ratios properly for all the axles.

Please note: Before installing and running 315's on the drive and tag of the Monaco Exec, there are a few mods that need to be done, which I will not share; due to a few reasons.

[tireman9]

I live 38 miles from the Canadian border on the Alaska Hwy at Northway. My front tires are showing inner edge wear and I am seeking advice on who to take it to for a diagnosis. Alignment, balance, king pins etc. Have contacted Alignment Center in Anchorage, unfortunately their sole heavy duty RV guy is out hunting. There is a Freightliner outlet in Anchorage that I emailed and have yet to recieve a response from. Am wondering whether anyone has found a reliable RV repair alignment shop in Alaska, or whether I should plan on stopping in Canada on the way South later this month. Tok, 50 miles North has some repair facilities, has anyone used Willards RV Repair in Tok Alaska? Have hear horror stories of his prices, but have not yet asked if he can do the repair or not.

I would appreciate any and all comments. Anchorage is over 400 miles away and Fairbanks is 250.

Thanks

Cowboy,

Sorry to hear of your problems. With tire wear it is always helpful if you can include pictures of the condition. "Inner edge wear" may be wear of the inside shoulder or it could be something different depending on your experiences with irregular wear.

Here is a post on "River-Wear". Note the great pictures.

Sorry to say I am not able to provide example pictures as I am on vacation and don't have all the info on my laptop.

Some possibilities are Shoulder Step / Chamfer wear where only part of the shoulder rib is wearing. Another would be Full shoulder rib wear. or Full side wear which is when each rib is worn less than the next as you move from one side of the tire to the other.

Again good pictures similar to what are shown in the post would help us provide more informed answer.

[andyshane]

Wow, CC, you sure brought out the big guns. We've got some super expertise here, best on the subject of tires, I believe. They've kept me and my family safe since 2010 with their good advice.

We've chatted over the last few years about Goodyear's propensity to develop bad wear patterns; your experience reminds me of those discussions. Like the F330021 says, transitioning to Michelin XZE Energy tires on the steering axle is just a good practice. If your tires have a DOT date prior to 2009, for example DOT 2909 (29th week of 2009), replacement is critical regardless of wear. I seem to recall that the blowout stats for the Goodyears are not pretty, once they start nearing their seventh year of life. Michelins do better, and can be used for ten years with annual inspections after the fifth; however, I think most of us are in agreement that steering tires must be younger than five, no matter what.

BTW, I passed overhead while you were driving, Saturday morning. You might've noticed the white streak across the sky, if not for those clouds.

[coldcowboy]

First off please accept my apologies for not responding at an earlier date. Thank you all for the comments and advice which I have received and very much appreciate. I ended up taking the coach to Fairbanks where a competent mechanic that I know and trust aired the tires to a correct pressure based on the corner weights at the time. He also provide me with the trick to air my tires with the onboard air compressor using an inline gauge to identify the compressor psi before attempting to put air in and not let air out. He also assured me the trip South of 3500 miles would not be a problem and also recommended that due to the age of the tires I should consider replacing them as soon as I could do so, preferably before making a return trip in the Spring. Also, although I wrote my chassis is a Freightliner, it is actually a Roadmaster.

For this topic I would like to report it as resolved. Will Brown thanks for the reminder of the Kenworth Dealer in Whitehorse. They have previously worked on this coach for me and if the road from Beaver Creek to Burwash wasn't a little rough I would do all of my shopping in Whitehorse as it is closer than Anchorage for me. Once again, thanks to everyone who contributed to this newbies knowledge of how to resolve a problem.

[five]

Coldcowboy,

Glad you got your problem solved. As a follow on comment, the GY/Michelin debate is just like a Chevy/Dodge/Ford/ debate. You can read any of these forums, and there are those with GYs that have wear problems and just as many Michelins with dry rot cracks and splits. I don't know how you come to a decision as to which to buy...other than price.