I have a little problem with my left rear tire. It has been making some noise so I pulled it off today and took a look. There are little concaves in the tread all the way around the tire. So I checked the other tires, all are fine. Struts are good, only about 10k miles on them, was aligned then too. Car drives straight and there doesn't seem to be any vibration.

So, I took it to the tire shop that I usually deal with. They tell me that it could be anything, tires not being rotated, out of balance, bad struts, bad alignment, etc. I am going to have them balanced later this week. I was told that the only way to stop the noise is a new tire. This is obvious, but I don't want to get a new tire just to have the problem happen again, would rather fix the problem first.

Anyone know what could be going on??

 

Well, most likely it sounds like you have a cupped tire...this can be caused by a tire balance issue or even a ****ty tire...if possible you should post a detailed pic of ur tread and tire make and i may be able to diagnose for you!

 

I may be able to get a picture tomorrow. I was trying to find one of the sites that shows pictures of different tire wear patterns. Cupping is what I immediately thought. I just don't want to spend money on new tires soon and find out that the same thing is going to happen again because something else is wrong.

 

Fireballer, if you were to be putting on new tires then your tire company if it's a legit tire store will tell you what's wrong with your suspension parts or why your tires are cupping..this way you get the problem taken care of from your tire dealer.

 

Yeah, they said to balance them and either put up with the noise or get new tires. He is pretty sure it was out of balance and not a suspension issue. I trust them pretty much, have always had them do good work on my car (they did the struts and alignment 6mos ago). I was just curious to see what others would say.

Definitely better than the worthless shop my mom went to. They put on 4 new tires and did an alignment, the car pulled to the left BAD the day she had it done. She pays no attention to it until I tell her to take it back, they fix it a little bit then blame it on the tires [&:]. She takes it to my tire shop and they fix it right up, all was great.