Unusual Tire Wear

Have any of you tire gurus seen this before? The new passenger tires on the front of my wife's car appear to be wearing a little unusually. The inside of the tire feels like it has been flattened at a 45 degree angle compared to the rounded surface on the outside. There doesn't appear to be any cupping or feathering and I can't see where it rubs anything. The rear tires don't appear to have this.

The tires have about 3k miles on them and the car had new shocks and was aligned when the tires were new. I also had the alignment double checked by a different shop when I first noticed the wear.

I'm at a loss.

 

Rubbing? Thats the only thing I can think of that could cause this. Specialy since itson the front andnot rear. Are they different size than the old ones?

 

Nope. Same size. It is weird. At first I thought the camber is off but it checks out fine.

 

That is weird, I'd be willing to bet then, that its rubbing somewhere. Maybe just somewhere its hard to see. Cause I would think if camber is off the whole tire would be worn down at an angle, not just that edge. GL with it, hope you figure it out.

 

Can you take a picture of it?

Are you sure it's just no too much camber? That would cause a relatively uniform gradation from no wear on the outside to lots of wear on the inside though. You seem to be describing something more drastic.

 

Does it look like this? Just about every Chevy Tahoe/Suburban that I've seen with older tires has had this problem, I'm not really sure what causes it as we've had it aligned. Have you aligned the tires lately?

 

either a tie rod or control arm ball joint is worn and has play.

easy to check. jack the front wheels up off the ground. grab the tire at the 12 o'clock and 6 o'clock positions and try to move the tire up and down. then, grab the tire at the 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock position and shake side to side. if you see or hear any movement or play of the ball joints/tie rod ends replace as necessary

 

forgot to add the wear can be attributed to worn shocks as well

 

It "feels" lke that tire looks but you really can't see it yet. I am trying to nip it in the bud before they do look like that!

New shocks and recently aligned. I checked the suspension components avout 6 months ago, but probably worth a check again!

 

It's the toe. It's out of whack.

 

I agree I had this happen on my old ranger.

 

I've had the alignment checked at two different shops. I get a printout of the results from the machine. Both show it within spec.