Tyres & Quattro

[nanafagis]

I know i'm probably preaching to people who know this already but yesterday I had a bitter sweet morning.

I arrived at work to hear my front drivers side hissing and sure enough my front tyre is torn on the inside. To be honest I think this one was my fault as it had looked a little low and I gave it a bit of air but hadn't noticed until it was too late. Turned out I had a slow puncture and had ran on flat or a bit, tearing the tyre.

I got a new tyre to the front drivers side & swapped the front and back drivers side tyres because a) I always get vibrations if i put new tyres on the front with this car and b) I had the same brand of tyre put on the back passenger side a couple of thousand miles ago, so newish treads and same pattern.

Anyway, to my point......I have been having AWFUL problems when pulling away from junctions and under load. The car has been bumping, juddering and a scrubbing feeling as though the front & back drive shafts aren't in sync. I had sort of resigned myself to a big repair bill, either engine mounts, diff or dmf (reading forums have the same symptoms as the ones I was having) Drove wayyyy too bad to even think it was tyre related. Today the problem has totally gone, 100% fixed. Just shows how sensitive the quattro is to tyres!!

Cost me £120 for a new tyre but £££'s in potential unnecessary problem finding when all along I just neeed a new tyre.

 

[quattrojames]

Was it so worn on the inside shoulder it was leaking air?!

 

[JohnboyC]

I definatly notice more noise from the quattro system during very low speed manoevres when the tyres wear down to the wear blocks......new tyres fix's it !

 

[nanafagis]

Was it so worn on the inside shoulder it was leaking air?!

Well, yes and no. It leaked the remainder of the air after it was torn but i think that the tear was caused by running on low pressure from a slow puncture rather than uneven wearing on the inside. There rest of the tyre (and the other 3 tyres) had worn very evenly and my tyre had bits of crushed glass in it which is why i thought it would be a puncture, rather than uneven wear.

I'm constantly checking for uneven wear though, as I went through a set of tyres every 3 months last year until my camber was fixed. This one wore differently to any of the previous camber related flats. Plus i've done 15k on these tyres with only one replacement cos of a pothole since fixing the camber. If it was wear related I think it would have gone after 4kmiles like the others used to.