WolfeMan

Hey everyone, was hoping someone could give me some ideas as to what I should do to fix this issue I have. It seems the front tires are leaning in slightly from the looks of the wear of my tire tread. Also, I get slight vibrations when driving at highway speeds.
As soon as I get a nice weekend I'm going to jack up the front and check to see if there's any wobble in any direction. Last year I replaced the wheel bearings, so those should be good and I'm not sure they'd be the cause of the problem anyhow but I'm not sure.

As you can see I need new tires like now but I'd like to fix the lean first.


Would those joints be the most likely thing to replace? I forget the name of them. There's not too much going on in there that I can imagine would need replacing.


I know there's more steps I can take to diagnose the problem but until I can do those, I was just hoping to get some ideas thrown at me to get a better idea of what the problem might be. Thanks in advance!

wizardpc

That would be the problem I'm having recently. It's off camber, but there's no such thing as camber adjustment on a solid axle.

Based on what I've found, it's probably either bad ball joints (which is what you have circled) or a bent axle.

I'm hoping it's that mine is on the original 18 year old ball joints.

kstopp

That is more than likely toe wear. Any alignment shop can fix this for you, or you can do it yourself with a tape measure if you are comfortable.

Those are ball joints you circled BTW. You can also check these by jacking up the front axle, supporting it on jack stands and prying up on the bottom of the tire with a pry bar. You can't try to move the tire like you can looking for worn wheel bearings, it needs the pry bar. It is normal for the top joint to have vertical play, by design it does that. The bottom joint is the load bearing one.

The bottom joint should not have more than 0.050" of axial play if you have a dial indicator you can attach and measure. The top joint should not have more than 0.060" of radial play.

Rogue4x4

Excellent post.

WolfeMan

Camber and ball joints. I only remember the names of things I've had t replace so far haha. Thanks for the info!

Toe wear. I'll have to look into that. I don't have a dial indicator so I can't measure the play but maybe I'll get one. No idea yet but I'll try adjusting the for the toe wear and see if that seems like it helps things. Thanks!

I agree.


Sorry for the late reply guys. Got laid off and kinda forgot about this for awhile. Thanks for all the help everyone!

RED RIVER

It looks toed out and over inflated. Does it run all over the road ?


adjust drag link until it's toed in a degree or two.


http://www.4x4xplor.com/alignment.html

madmanmarty

Toe out will wear the inside of the tire.
You must check the entire front end first as suggested,then check your alignment.
Let us know.

DFlintstone

Alex, I'll take toe-in for 1000. We don't get to, or normally need to adjust caster or camber.
Toe-in on the other hand needs to be set about anytime anything in the steering is changed. Yours is not right. "feathering" you can feel by gently feeling the tread with your fingers.

I would jack the front end, then look for play anywhere, TRE (Tie rod End) go often and first. With the "sloppy" removed, (maybe wheel bearings or TRE), 1/8 inch toe in, Measured at the tire tread will work. You measure after forward movement, on a flat surface. 1/8 in is MAX for a stock tire. With a larger tire/wheel, the "lesser degree" should be fine. It's just to give a slight pressure on the linkage to not have it wobble. Too much does what you have. (to much toe-out will eat the tires also)

Shops often will check it free, and tell you what's worn out.