New Firestone Champion Fuel Fighters

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Sep 10, 2009
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Location
Illinois
I just installed a new set of these tires on my 98 Olds. Also had it aligned. And what I'm noticing is the same with the old tires. When I get to 75-80 mph I feel ever so slight vibration but the steering wheel isn't shaking at all. My concern is am I wearing out these new tires fast are causing bad tread wear? The car tracks perfectly straight to as the alignment is spot on.
 
Since the vibration was there before AND after new tires, it's not likely tires.

Make sure it isn't the road. If you can only get to 75-80 mph only on one road, you have to eliminate that possibility by finding another place to test.

A slight vibration isn't enough to cause premature wear.


.
 
My thinking is...
Maybe your old tires needed a rebalance and you never got it done.
And maybe your installer didn't do a proper job balancing you new Firestone Champion Fuel Fighters.

I am going through this right now with my new Pirelli Cinturato P7 A/S+. They were out of balance right from the start and I gave my installer a 2nd chance to rebalance them. They noticed that all 4 tires(in 3wks/300mi) were out of balance on the insides. The rebalance made things a little better but, not gone completely.

So, I had them Road Force Balanced yesterday. And this made things RIGHT! But, the guy doing the RFB said...

"If my installer had done a Dynamic Balance rather than a Static Balance, I wouldn't have had any issues from the beginning". But the guy doing the RFB only does RFB'ing and is a traveling tire installer. He came to my home.

In a nutshell, give your installer/tire shop another chance to rebalance your tires before taking the next step(RFB or suspension work or wheel work).
 
Probably a bent wheel or a bad CV axle.

Could even be something like a bad motor/transmission mount.
 
Originally Posted by JohnG
If you feel the vibration in the seat, I've got two words for you:

Road Force Balance.


That is 3 words!

;-)

KrzyÅ›
 
Count yourself lucky, that slight vibration is a reminder that the steaming pile known as an olds 98, had a poor suspension for high speed use when new, and is unlikely to have gotten much better after a quarter century of aging and fuel saver tires.

You are driving too fast for the conditions. If you must, try swapping the wheels front to rear.

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Every Firestone tire I've ever had rode hard, were difficult to balance (out of round) and tended to be a bit noisy...with one exception. The Firestone Denstination LE. But they wear well and don't dry rot in the Florida heat. Anecdotal at best. FWIW
 
Quote
I just installed a new set of these tires on my 98 Olds. Also had it aligned. And what I'm noticing is the same with the old tires. When I get to 75-80 mph I feel ever so slight vibration but the steering wheel isn't shaking at all. My concern is am I wearing out these new tires fast are causing bad tread wear? The car tracks perfectly straight to as the alignment is spot on.


BTW Mark72, your 98 Olds was most likely built on the same chassis as my 99 STS. This car was EXTREMELY sensitive to tire vibrations from "out of round" (it's more than that, but I'm simplifying) tires.
And yes, Road Force Balance did eventually solve my problems. However, I had to educate the tire technician on the Hunter machine, AND had to get the tires down below 15# Road Force (yes, it's measurable) before the tires were right.

Good luck!
 
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