Tyre shaving - still around or a lost art?

Hi all,

For a number of years now my 'trol has had the dreaded "Patrol wobbles" but they've never been bad enough for me to get off my bum and do something about it. But the 'trol now throws its head like an unbroken brumby, really bad between 80-90km/h.

I've been slack too and not rotated the tyres for some time but did so on the weekend. It has reduced the severity of the wobbles substantially, but the wobble is still there somewhere in the steering/damper/drag link/panhard/swaybar/pitman arm/lower control arms/bearings or who-knows where!

Before I start replacing bushes or components though, I need my tyre profiles to be uniform so at least they are smooth and not contributing to the vibrations. At the moment the tyre treads have substantial heel/toe wear (front-to-back wear on the tread blocks). Without uniform tyre profiles I don't think I'll be able to tell whether the work just completed has improved the base cause of the wobbles.

Check this pic. This is the left rear tyre. I have just driven up my concrete driveway and dirt/dust can be seen on the parts of the tread that have contacted the ground. The black parts have not touched the road/driveway. Scary!!

Attachment 83281

Anyway, to my question. Are there any tyre shops out there that can still shave tyres? I understand it was a common practice in the days prior to radial tyres but I can't easily see a shop that can still provide this service.

Cheers.

Do a burnout then put the fronts on the rear and do another burnout. All fixed lol. Make sure the surface is flat prior to doing said burnout.

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Originally Posted by nissannewby

Do a burnout then put the fronts on the rear and do another burnout. All fixed lol. Make sure the surface is flat prior to doing said burnout.

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Good onya Matty, I knew some braniac would come through with that one! :D

Nekminnet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcT9XT6J-PU

@ Mudnut....That is what happens when you forget to lock in the front hubs when you heat up a duramax mate :animierte-sm

However, is it possible to switch lefts and rights and rears and fronts over with with other there Plas? The rears if moved to front may need a balance though.

Just in case some camber wear throwing wheel camber off more?

This resolved some of the lefties creep and shimmy issues on my 35s for Truckus, but I dont have clearance issues with current set up.

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Originally Posted by Truckus

@ Mudnut....That is what happens when you forget to lock in the front hubs when you heat up a duramax mate :animierte-sm

However, is it possible to switch lefts and rights and rears and fronts over with with other there Plas? The rears if moved to front may need a balance though.

Just in case some camber wear throwing wheel camber off more?

This resolved some of the lefties creep and shimmy issues on my 35s for Truckus, but I dont have clearance issues with current set up.

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Because it had been so long since I did a rotation I decided on a diagonal rotation pattern. FR to RL. RL to FR. FL to RR. RR to FL.

That pic of the rear left is after the rotation, so it was on the FR and rotating towards the right of picture previously.

OK gotcha, so perhaps a LRear to RRear, and RFront to LFront is worth a try. At least that gives you a baseline for comparison.

Thats said, yep, that rotation would be the normal way to do that on a sedan, but...and I am just mentioning due to Nissan wheel alignment sets up for Aussie cambered roads, that may be what is giving issues there mate....or perhaps contributing to them.

Like I said, I recently played this game with my rig with big rubber, and was surprised at the differences made, and may save unneeded drag link adjustments that introduce the whole toe in toe out issues, I don't think castor angle will be in play here, unless the tyres have some funky pre wear.

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Originally Posted by Truckus

OK gotcha, so perhaps a LRear to RRear, and RFront to LFront is worth a try. At least that gives you a baseline for comparison.

Thats said, yep, that rotation would be the normal way to do that on a sedan, but...and I am just mentioning due to Nissan wheel alignment sets up for Aussie cambered roads, that may be what is giving issues there mate....or perhaps contributing to them.

Like I said, I recently played this game with my rig with big rubber, and was surprised at the differences made, and may save unneeded drag link adjustments that introduce the whole toe in toe out issues, I don't think castor angle will be in play here, unless the tyres have some funky pre wear.

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Yeah it's only got a 2" lift and I didn't go with drop boxes. Honestly I haven't had it aligned for ages so I don't know the camber settings etc. so maybe an alignment is in order so I can see where things are at.

But there is a shimmy in the front end somewhere, caused by some thing. I think I've exacerbated the effects by being lazy and not rotating rubber, and therfore exaggerated the shimmy with "shimmied" rubber. Does that make sense?? :)

Sure I get the shimmy on shimmy analogy.

I recently had to get that sorted as well as part of an alignment (with Truckus lift, needed additional offset in the king pins swivel hub assembly, we already have longer radius arms and drop boxs for the geometry of the steering and drive line).

Evidently the greatest shimmy gremlin is king pin shim related.

Some handy viewing for checks, maybe that may help too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPLgglRbDF0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fReUfX6H_rs

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Originally Posted by Truckus

Sure I get the shimmy on shimmy analogy.

I recently had to get that sorted as well as part of an alignment (with Truckus lift, needed additional offset in the king pins swivel hub assembly, we already have longer radius arms and drop boxs for the geometry of the steering and drive line).

Evidently the greatest shimmy gremlin is king pin shim related.

Some handy viewing for checks, maybe that may help too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPLgglRbDF0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fReUfX6H_rs

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Thanks mate. Jeez after reading your posts today my shimmy suddenly feels insignificant. Nevertheless your post above has reminded me the mob I currently use for mechanical work (very occasionally) did remove a king pin shim about 3 years ago and I complained about shimmy after that. Can't remember why they pulled it out but might need to replace it perhaps.

Yes, poor old Truckus in the wars at the moment.

At least perhaps, a positive that the things I am learning about his issues various, may hold solutions for others having similar issues. Our current one is a doozy though!

I had the wobbles pretty bad and uneven tyre wear (outer edges). All mechanicals were fine ... had Tru Track in Bunbury W.A. throw in an offset bearing and it runs straight and true no matter what the tyres are like ..

Thanks @timbo2410 . TBH I don't know much about offset bearings but did a bit of a search and found this post by @MudRunnerTD : http://www.nissanpatrol.com.au/forum...Bearings/page2

Interesting. I had new bearings replaced just under 2 years ago and made no difference to the wobbles.

I've also read the offset bearings may wear diff seals prematurely though?

Darren, your post is 8.5 years old now. How has the offset bearing stood the test of time? Any seal issues? I might be interested in looking closer at an offset LH bearing.

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Originally Posted by Plasnart

Thanks @timbo2410 . TBH I don't know much about offset bearings but did a bit of a search and found this post by @MudRunnerTD : http://www.nissanpatrol.com.au/forum...Bearings/page2

Interesting. I had new bearings replaced just under 2 years ago and made no difference to the wobbles.

I've also read the offset bearings may wear diff seals prematurely though?

Darren, your post is 8.5 years old now. How has the offset bearing stood the test of time? Any seal issues? I might be interested in looking closer at an offset LH bearing.

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It did a great job mate. Interestingly this weekend I am stripping the front of the GU. Last time I did it was about 3 years ago I think and at that time i pulled the offset out but only did so because the upper offset race had collapsed. I didn't know this until I went to remove it and it was half missing. The thin wall had crumbled but had done A Lot of work.

Rotate your tyres ans put the scallops to the back ans they will flatten out then rotate back to the front.

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Originally Posted by MudRunnerTD

Rotate your tyres ans put the scallops to the back ans they will flatten out then rotate back to the front.

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Yeah they were badly scalloped at the rear of the tread blocks prior to rotation. Don't understand how this happens but after rotation all scallops are at the front of the blocks.

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Originally Posted by MudRunnerTD

It did a great job mate. Interestingly this weekend I am stripping the front of the GU. Last time I did it was about 3 years ago I think and at that time i pulled the offset out but only did so because the upper offset race had collapsed. I didn't know this until I went to remove it and it was half missing. The thin wall had crumbled but had done A Lot of work.

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Do you still recommend an offset bearing now you've been there done that? You went back to standard bearing because why?

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Originally Posted by Plasnart

Do you still recommend an offset bearing now you've been there done that? You went back to standard bearing because why?

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I went back soley because I pulled it apart one day to repack the bearing and found the collapsed race and it was a daily. I needed to fix it immediately and paid too dollar for a kit from Repco to get Ilit back on the road by the Monday.

I was absolutely happy with the offset bearings.