Plaid 21” rear tire woes - factory defect?

[buckets0fun]

View attachment 963905
Just had mine done and added the N2Itive camber arms. Also replaced the bad Michelins with Pirellis PZ4 and sticking with the 21 inch wheels.


Hopefully it fixes it but I'll monitor it.

It won’t, but I do wish you the best.

The rear toe out will absolutely destroy the tires. In short order no less. Get those set to a -.1 or -.15 or as near zero as you enjoy driving and watch the tires last as they should.

Have you always had right rear tire wear issues over left? Does/has the back of the car want(Ed) to drive one direction while you steer the other?

No offense meant with this, but does the alignment guy have coke bottle thick glasses and maybe missed the negative sign on the rear toe settings? I can’t think of any reason someone wants the rear of a model S to be twitchy and unstable at speed…. Unless you autocross it and haven’t told us?

 

[Awiner]

It won’t, but I do wish you the best.

The rear toe out will absolutely destroy the tires. In short order no less. Get those set to a -.1 or -.15 or as near zero as you enjoy driving and watch the tires last as they should.

Have you always had right rear tire wear issues over left? Does/has the back of the car want(Ed) to drive one direction while you steer the other?

No offense meant with this, but does the alignment guy have coke bottle thick glasses and maybe missed the negative sign on the rear toe settings? I can’t think of any reason someone wants the rear of a model S to be twitchy and unstable at speed…. Unless you autocross it and haven’t told us?

Correct. You want rear toe to be more in the +0.15 range. Under acceleration those rubber suspension bushings will send those tires toe out. So setting them while static at the height you mostly will be driving in at +0.15 will help more than anything.

 

[AAKEE]

View attachment 963905
Just had mine done and added the N2Itive camber arms. Also replaced the bad Michelins with Pirellis PZ4 and sticking with the 21 inch wheels.


Hopefully it fixes it but I'll monitor it.

Everything set and adjusted in LOW only ?

 

[DayTrippin]

Yes, set it in LOW if you spend most of your time at higher speeds where it defaults.

 

[buckets0fun]

Correct. You want rear toe to be more in the +0.15 range. Under acceleration those rubber suspension bushings will send those tires toe out. So setting them while static at the height you mostly will be driving in at +0.15 will help more than anything.

You want NO positive toe on an S/X that you’re not autocrossing. That /is/ toe OUT. Toe out destroys tires in the shortest of orders.

Sllliiiiiight Negative toe in the rear, but as close to zero as possible(-.19 to 0.0)… unless y’all like typing threads asking about tire wear and complaining about “factory defects”?

 

[buckets0fun]

Yes, set it in LOW if you spend most of your time at higher speeds where it defaults.

Orrrrr

Set it to never drop the car and set the height to exactly where you wish to drive near all the time. Because… comfort is way better on a big body car.

 

[buckets0fun]

Because everyone needs to read it multiple times for it to be real life…

Here’s the exact same thing on another air suspension equipped EV. Rivians’ Tires Are Wearing Out in as Little as 6,000 Miles. Here’s Why

The same thing can be seen in many of the air suspension equipped cars. From 2004 touareg/cayenne to rivian and everything in between.

Your camber isn’t destroying your tires. Your toe settings are.

 

[Sam1]

Orrrrr

Set it to never drop the car and set the height to exactly where you wish to drive near all the time. Because… comfort is way better on a big body car.

You can NOT override the low setting default when the car reaches 70 mph. It is impossible.

 

[Awiner]

You want NO positive toe on an S/X that you’re not autocrossing. That /is/ toe OUT. Toe out destroys tires in the shortest of orders.

Sllliiiiiight Negative toe in the rear, but as close to zero as possible(-.19 to 0.0)… unless y’all like typing threads asking about tire wear and complaining about “factory defects”?

You have your positive and negative backwards. Toe out (tires pointing outwards) is negative toe. Toe in (tires pointing inwards) is positive toe. You want a little positive toe because upon acceleration the tires will toe out a bit (rubber suspension bushings).

Rear Tow out (negative toe) is what really destroys the sidewall to tread edge on the rear 21” tires.

 

[TSLA Pilot]

You have your positive and negative backwards. Toe out (tires pointing outwards) is negative toe. Toe in (tires pointing inwards) is positive toe. You want a little positive toe because upon acceleration the tires will toe out a bit (rubber suspension bushings).

Rear Tow out (negative toe) is what really destroys the sidewall to tread edge on the rear 21” tires.

Right.

AND . . . it magically has ZERO IMPACT on the 19" Pirelli OEM tires.

Funny that.

Come on people, can we PLEASE stop with constant attacks on alignment and Tesla when the problem lies at Michelin's feet?

Thanks.

 

[n2mb_racing]

Orrrrr

Set it to never drop the car and set the height to exactly where you wish to drive near all the time. Because… comfort is way better on a big body car.

We don't really get a choice. It drops to low on the highway no matter what setting you put it in.

But, interesting point about the toe. Here are my most recent alignment settings. I kind of think the Tesla alignment system might be a random number generator, because the "before" doesn't match the "after" from my alignment just a month earlier. Or the one a month before that. I'm pretty sure they didn't do anything that would have moved the alignment between the last two.

But, looks like I have sufficient positive toe, which seems to be pointing in, hopefully to avoid rear tire problems.

 

[n2mb_racing]

Right.

AND . . . it magically has ZERO IMPACT on the 19" Pirelli OEM tires.

Funny that.

Come on people, can we PLEASE stop with constant attacks on alignment and Tesla when the problem lies at Michelin's feet?

Thanks.

I'd agree on the delamination being Michelin's problem. My prior 21s on my P90D also wore heavily on the inside edges from the excessive negative camber, but they didn't fail.

 

[AAKEE]

Yes, set it in LOW if you spend most of your time at higher speeds where it defaults.

If ypor answer was to me, Yes, I will do that when I decide what way to go. Always low, maybe lower just a tad.

My question was to know how @finalzero0 did the setup….as I think Tesla does a mishmash between medium and low.

 

[Sam1]

Right.

AND . . . it magically has ZERO IMPACT on the 19" Pirelli OEM tires.

Funny that.

Come on people, can we PLEASE stop with constant attacks on alignment and Tesla when the problem lies at Michelin's feet?

Thanks.

Show us a single instance of excess inner tire wear by someone who installed a camber adjustment system and had an alignment done.

 

[TSLA Pilot]

Show us a single instance of excess inner tire wear by someone who installed a camber adjustment system and had an alignment done.

And I counter:

Show us a single instance of excess inner tire wear . . . with ANYONE with the 19" OEM Pirelli tires. No pressure loss, no delaminations, nothing in comparison to what is apparently consistent and chronic failure of the tread/tire carcass of the Michelin 21" OEM tires.

Zip.

IF all the alignment posts were accurate, by all rights we'd be seeing similar failure rates with the 19" Pirellis, yet we seemingly have none thus far?

But for some it's The Alignment Hill that they're willing to die on because they're all armchair suspension engineers (some of whom are selling some kit on the internet perhaps?).

Geesh.

Some times correlation means points at something folks--it can be one heck of a clue.

 

[emailforbrett]

You’re comparing apples to oranges. These inner tread separation issues are found in the 21” tires, not the 19” tires you brought up.

 

[Sam1]

And I counter:

Show us a single instance of excess inner tire wear . . . with ANYONE with the 19" OEM Pirelli tires. No pressure loss, no delaminations, nothing in comparison to what is apparently consistent and chronic failure of the tread/tire carcass of the Michelin 21" OEM tires.

Zip.

IF all the alignment posts were accurate, by all rights we'd be seeing similar failure rates with the 19" Pirellis, yet we seemingly have none thus far?

But for some it's The Alignment Hill that they're willing to die on because they're all armchair suspension engineers (some of whom are selling some kit on the internet perhaps?).

Geesh.

Some times correlation means points at something folks--it can be one heck of a clue.

Why are you deflecting?

All you have to do is post a single instance of evidence to prove your assertion. That's it, I'm just asking to see one. Show us who on here that has installed a camber kit (of ANY brand) and had an alignment done, that is seeing excessive inner tire wear on the Michelins.

 

[n2mb_racing]

And I counter:

Show us a single instance of excess inner tire wear . . . with ANYONE with the 19" OEM Pirelli tires. No pressure loss, no delaminations, nothing in comparison to what is apparently consistent and chronic failure of the tread/tire carcass of the Michelin 21" OEM tires.

Zip.

IF all the alignment posts were accurate, by all rights we'd be seeing similar failure rates with the 19" Pirellis, yet we seemingly have none thus far?

But for some it's The Alignment Hill that they're willing to die on because they're all armchair suspension engineers (some of whom are selling some kit on the internet perhaps?).

Geesh.

Some times correlation means points at something folks--it can be one heck of a clue.

The aspect ratio of the 19s is really different and perhaps more forgiving. I still had serious inner shoulder wear on my previous 21s, although they never catastrophically failed. I forget what tires they were. The OEM from 2016.

 

[cmarshack]

The aspect ratio of the 19s is really different and perhaps more forgiving. I still had serious inner shoulder wear on my previous 21s, although they never catastrophically failed. I forget what tires they were. The OEM from 2016.

It's this right here ^
Michelin has nothing to do with it, just happen to be the OE suppler of the 21" tires. I have had 3 Model S's all with 22' wheels, all ran Continental ExtremeContact DWS and all failed at the inner edge long beofre there was any real wear on the rest of the tire. On my 2013 I installed camber arms and it fixed the "issue". My 2020 i just bought new rear tires every 10K miles and my 2022 I have been swapping the tires left to right in a rotation to get 24K miles out of my last pair, which failed on the inner edge before the tire hit the wear bars (left me stranded in Bishop CA for two days).

The issue is a combination of low-profile tires (21" or 22"), weight (heavy ass car), torque and camber. If you don't want to run tiny wheels, then only one of those you can adjust is the camber.

 

[emailforbrett]

Misery loves company…

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