Tire balance

Mdrobb

New member
I am running Goodyear Duratrac 315/70r17 and just had them rotated (5 tire rotation) with 5,000 miles on them. I have had a shimmy in the steering wheel at about 45 - 55 mph since the rotation. I have had the front tires balanced three times and it is still there. The last two times the shop said that they had road force balanced them. Shimmy is still there. Am I missing something here?
 

RKJK10

New member
IF the tires are balanced properly check for worn components, unit bearing, track bar bolts and bushings, tie rod ends etc...
 

Mdrobb

New member
Everything feels tight. I pulled the front DS and that made no difference. Shop suggested new tires might be the next step. One has less than 6k on it and the other is brand new (the spare).
 

JayKay

Caught the Bug
Everything feels tight. I pulled the front DS and that made no difference. Shop suggested new tires might be the next step. One has less than 6k on it and the other is brand new (the spare).

Even though they're new, it's possible that one is out of round. Balancing may not eliminate the vibration. Talk to your shop about GoodYear doing a goodwill adjustment on the tires due to ride complaint
 

2Cross

Caught the Bug
I had the same problem with my current Goodyear MTRs.
Finally put "Equal" in them and problem solved.
 

JohnnyD

New member
Hmm, I had issues with Mtrks but I thought duratracs were supposed to spot on...guess it can happen with any tire.

Give Goodyear a call, if all else checks out underneath your ride, they may do something for ya
 
ALL Goodyear tires are a bitch to balance. The bigger they are the worse the problem.

Road Force balancing worked for my MTRs and the wife's Duratracs were pretty good out of the box. As mentioned, they are new enough that they need to correct this for you.
 

JeepinLife

Caught the Bug
Like stated before. One is out of round. Some times getting them rotated and rebalanced makes it worse depending on how they do the balancing and at what speed. This happened to wife's car. Find the tire that hops on the balancer and replace it.
 

A.J.

Active Member
Goodyear has had some issues with balance in the past several years that are supposed to be corrected. It sounds like as others have stated you may have a tire that is out of round. If they are fairly new it should be under warrantee. Tire shops get lazy and reluctant to take care of it sometimes. Be diligent, don't wait until they are too worn to get full replacement. It won't be the whole set, just one or maybe two. If it is felt in the steering wheel it is one of the fronts. The way to test this is to rotate the fronts to the rear and drive it to see if the vibration changes (should be felt in the seat/shifter/floor). If you switch them and it stays the same (steering wheel) might have another problem. If you bought them at a store take them where you bought them. If you bought them online the tire store will be even more reluctant to warrantee because they did not make the profit and now have to do the internal paper work etc. etc. to get credit for it.
 

JayKay

Caught the Bug
If there is more than 2/32" tread worn off, Goodyear most likely won't warranty it as a workmanship defect, it would be claimed as a goodwill for ride complaint. So you may end up paying a percentage of the new tire cost, but it's better than paying full price. Get it taken care of ASAP! The more tread you wear off, the more you're gonna pay out of pocket.
 
If there is more than 2/32" tread worn off, Goodyear most likely won't warranty it as a workmanship defect, it would be claimed as a goodwill for ride complaint. So you may end up paying a percentage of the new tire cost, but it's better than paying full price. Get it taken care of ASAP! The more tread you wear off, the more you're gonna pay out of pocket.

Really I think the 2/32 thing is fair. I have 20k miles on my MTRs with lots of trail use and have only worn 3/32 of an inch. (I do a 5 tire rotation though so it helps some.)
 

JohnnyD

New member
If there is more than 2/32" tread worn off, Goodyear most likely won't warranty it as a workmanship defect, it would be claimed as a goodwill for ride complaint. So you may end up paying a percentage of the new tire cost, but it's better than paying full price. Get it taken care of ASAP! The more tread you wear off, the more you're gonna pay out of pocket.

^^^this...I had case...documented up the wazoo...got all the way to corporate and because I had 1100 miles on them they told to me go scratch... I didn't really want to go here..not trying to bash GY...just won't get my money no mo

I sold mine to a local guy who was using for wheeling only didn't care..
 

JayKay

Caught the Bug
^^^this...I had case...documented up the wazoo...got all the way to corporate and because I had 1100 miles on them they told to me go scratch... I didn't really want to go here..not trying to bash GY...just won't get my money no mo

I sold mine to a local guy who was using for wheeling only didn't care..

Goodyear is not the only one, 2/32" is industry standard on workmanship claims (pulling, out of round, etc.)
 
Unfortunately the biggest road block is usually the rep or dealer. It's work that they will not get paid for to swap out the tire.

I had this issue with another brand on a tire with a bad belt and finally went to a different rep. I had a new tire in two days. The old shop was blaming the MFG but the new place seemed to be able to resolve it pronto. :crazyeyes:
 

JayKay

Caught the Bug
Unfortunately the biggest road block is usually the rep or dealer. It's work that they will not get paid for to swap out the tire.

I had this issue with another brand on a tire with a bad belt and finally went to a different rep. I had a new tire in two days. The old shop was blaming the MFG but the new place seemed to be able to resolve it pronto. :crazyeyes:

Partially true...the shop has the right to charge the customer for mount/balance. The tire manufacturer is not responsible for labor of installation. The dealers vendor will credit the dealer once the vendor receives the tire and required paperwork.
 
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