Rear Tires Are Wearing Unevenly......

Hello,

New to the forum. A friend of mine suggested joining a forum and that maybe you guys could help with a very odd problem I am having. Any help would be appreciated as Toyota has no idea. I will try and make the story short but basically the inside of my rear tires are wearing excessively. So much so it's actually become quite the hazard.

First the truck is a 2010 Dual Cab Tacoma sr5 4.0 v6 and I have followed any and all scheduled maintenance as this is a leased truck.

1. My wife had an accident with the truck approximately Nov. 2010. Here is a photo of the damage. Impact was on the right/passenger side. She was turning right at a stop sign and struck a parked trailer. Truck was repaired right away, I asked the repair shop to check alignment as what she had hit had actually punctured the tire on the passenger side. Got the truck back and everything seemed fine. Truck always drove straight, no pulling, etc.
Damage to truck.

2. Go through winter (my first winter with the truck) and notice the truck is a little slippery in bad conditions but rack it up to being bad tires as Toyota had put all seasons on the truck. In the spring I first noticed this uneven tire wear. The following is the first set of tires I have gone through. This wear is only on the inside of both rear tires.
Closeup of first set of tires.
Photo showing the uneven wear of the tires.

3. Replaced the tires hoping that simple alignment was off. Hoping this was just a fluke of some kind. This is now a photo of the second set of tires that went on the truck and still the same uneven wear on the inside of the rear tires.
2nd set of rear tires still wearing excessively on inside.

4. So I am on the third set of tires now and when it last went in for it's last oil change. They checked the tread depth and they told me the tread is still wearing unevenly after 2 alignments, I am out of ideas. Toyota is now speculating the the frame is bent from the accident but I find that hard to believe has it was not a very high speed accident and that the truck was impacted on the right/passenger side so why would both rear tires be wearing on the inside evenly, etc.


EDIT: for spelling and grammar.

 

My tires do that to. I just get them switched around after a while, so they wear out on the other side as well.

 

How mamy miles are on the truck?

 

Without getting technical and actually offering any advice, I'm curious why either: Toyota isn't resolving the problem since it's leased, or the body shop isn't fixing it to full resolve?

 

I am thinking the rear axle housing may be bent, creating a toed in condition on the rear tires. I am not sure that an alignment tech would catch that, since these trucks are not 4 wheel alignable.

I would take it back to the shop that repaired the crash damage and see what their opinion is. This is probably out of a normal alignment guy's area of expertise.

 

maybe you tweaked the rear end on your truck when you got into the accident.

 

Beat me to it, So this^

 

I have started to do that.

52k km --> 32k miles

The body shop turned out to be more crooked than this problem. I stupidly listened to a suggestion my mother-in-law made. Biggest mistake in this whole thing. They are putting up a massive and saying I caused the damage after the repair. I'm pursuing taking them to court but in the mean time I am destroying tires faster that a fat kid eating cake.

I have now come to the conclusion that the two different Toyota dealerships I have since taken it to are not really concerned by the problem. They say the accident caused the problem but at the same time they agree the tire wear doesn't make sense from how the accident went down. They have no obligation to fix because they just say the accident did it.

Maybe, for sure but considering the impact is on the right side shouldn't I be seeing wear on the same side of both tires not the inside of both? If that makes any sense.

 

Just take it to an alignment shop and tell them what's going on. Ask them to get you a printout for the rear axle.

Without a doubt you have some negative camber and there really shouldn't be, so the housing is bent I'd suspect. Why it's doing it on both I've no idea. However the printout should give you an idea of what is going on.

camber on the rear axle should be I'd assume ideally within 1/2* of 0* on each side.

 

Is your diff messed up? Look on the inside. May be the problem. I would just slap new tires on it and sell it and buy a different one man

 

They have to prove the accident caused it to deny coverage. Call Toyota hotline.

 

Someone else suggested the diff as well. Thanks that is a new suggestion I have not received yet. It's lease so yeah it's going back.

Hmmmm.

 

Thank you everyone for your comments so far, much appreciated.

 

Because I'm new here are some obligatory photo of my truck. Not very exciting but....

 

time to trade it in.

 

I got it stuck in the mud once.

 

Yeah, I'm hearing that a lot.

 

seriously, you take a hit on trading it in and pay 50 more per month, or you pay 1000 every 6 months for new tires....

 

Trade IT. and buy one.

 

That crashed pic doesn't look too bad on the surface, but it does show something very serious; do you see how the wheel is pushed way toward the back of the opening? Factory setup is with the wheel right in the middle of the opening like this:

A bent frame would not cause this symptom since it would skew the entire rear end. What you have is a bent axle housing. The passenger side wheel was driven backwards, causing the two back wheels to point outward from each other. As you drive, the axle shafts themselves are flexing, and could fail at any moment. The bent axle housing is 100% the cause for the inside rear tire wear. The frame could also be tweaked, but is not contributing to the tire wear. The rear axle housing must be replaced or straightened (requires extremely competent mechanic). Once done, your tire problem will be solved.