Mis-matched Rear Tires '93 Bonneville

Anonymous-0

Well-known Member
I am taking our trusty old '93 Bonneville in for a front end alignment tomorrow. The car is a beater, but is 100% reliable as our third vehicle. It has pulled to the right for some time. Tires are mis-matched, but all the factory correct size except the driver's rear, which is a 235 (should be 225). Problem has nothing to do with the larger tire as it's only been on the car for a week and the pullingto tbe right's been going onfor over a year.

Question is, are the alignment people gonna say that's my problem, and there's no way it's gonna go straight down the road till all four are the same size?

Thanks,
Glenn F.
 
I'd have to say they'll probably refuse to do the alignment.

Even if they do the alignment, it will be basically money wasted.

I'd suggest changing the front tires from side to side and see if the pull goes with it. Could be the front tires.

When I still had my '89 Chevy pickup, it began pulling to the right severely. Turned out a belt was separating in the right front tire. You couldn't feel it in the steering wheel, but it was there.
 
Glenn, see if you can't track down a matching sized tire. I agree that you should swap the fronts from side to side to see if the pull follows the tire. That was standard operating procedure when we were in the business.
 
Excellent advice Hoof Print & Goose. I'm gonna cancel my appointment first thing in the morning and rule out a few things on my oen first.

Thank you,
Glenn F.
 
I would like to know why. Years ago they could take a car with no tires on it, only the wheels for the machine to latch onto and do a alignment as the machines put the vehical in the proper place and unless a tire was so oversized it would hold up the car more than the machine lifted it they could do the alignment. You may still have problems but it would be tires not the alignment.
 

Keep in mind that on a FRONT wheel drive car, the REAR axle can also get out of line, which causes considerable vibrations, shimmy, etc.
 
(quoted from post at 06:25:11 04/11/13) I'd have to say they'll probably refuse to do the alignment.

Even if they do the alignment, it will be basically money wasted.

I'd suggest changing the front tires from side to side and see if the pull goes with it. Could be the front tires.

When I still had my '89 Chevy pickup, it began pulling to the right severely. Turned out a belt was separating in the right front tire. You couldn't feel it in the steering wheel, but it was there.

The best way that works for me is to put the fronts on the rear and the rear on the front... I have seen two many times were moving the tires side to side still leaves a issue... If the issue goes away doing it my way then its one of the original front tires. If I don't see anything wrong with the tires I reverse them one at a time on the rim... Its rare i can not get the pull out if its a tire issue by reversing the tire on the rim...Most tires are blackwall now if I remove one for repair you can bet your arse it gets marked so I don't install it reversed on the rim from the way it was originally installed...... I have sold used tires that pulled bad the fix was to reverse it on the rim. Memory is the only thing I can think of that caused a pull that was not their before if all looks good.

I guess what works for some don't work for others I have never fixed a pull issue by swapping from side to side... I may have improved it but did not know which tire was the bad one... I for sure knew it was a tire issue when it drastically improved it by swapping them to a different axle... Once I knew this it was a matter of playing with the problem tires..
 

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